


Gone Bunkers!

by ElenoftheWays



Series: Re-Synchronizing Pines Twin Powers [3]
Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Admit it you want to go to Mabel-palooza too!, Adventure, Brothers busting each other’s chops, Canon Compliant, Ford Pines is a Good Brother, Gen, Getting to Know Each Other, M/M, Mabel’s line at the end of this is totally worth the price of admission, Monster of the Week, Movie References, POV Alternating, PTSD-Suffering Old Men Loving One Another The Best They Can OK?, Period Typical Attitudes, Period-Typical Sexism, Post-Episode: s02e13 Dungeons Dungeons and More Dungeons, Pre-Episode: s02e14 The Stanchurian Candidate, Stan Pines is a Good Brother, Stan-Hugs, Stanford Pines forgiving himself, Survivor Guilt, The most accurate description of Gideon Gleeful ever and you can quote me!, Vomiting, Yiddish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-19
Updated: 2021-03-19
Packaged: 2021-03-28 07:21:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30135993
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElenoftheWays/pseuds/ElenoftheWays
Summary: Stanley rolled and fell backward as if something spiraled from under one of his hands.“OW!”“What the h...” he reached under the blue plaid blanket and pulled out a 1/4 of a tree branch with tinier twigs attached to the top.“Oh, no-no-no-no-no!”Ford’s pulse hammered as he grabbed the back of his head.“Uh, Ford?” drew out from his right side, “What are we looking at exactly?”The smooth grooved handle dropped into his hand.Stanford walked backward off the blanket and took a running start, and leaped up past the door.“Stanford Pines, WHAT in the name of P.T. Barnum do you think you're doing?!”“It’s a portion of the lever!”"This is bad.”“Why, what’s down there?”“A very pissed-off shapeshifter.”“And why is it pissed-off exactly?”He sighed down to the plaid pattern on the blanket.“B-because...” sheepishly mumbled down at his shoes, “because I tested on it since birth.”“Yup, sounds about right.""Well, come on, then!”
Relationships: Ford Pines & Stan Pines
Series: Re-Synchronizing Pines Twin Powers [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1818082
Kudos: 4





	Gone Bunkers!

His bones hurt like a real sonuva bitch. 

Stanley opened his eyes, realizing he fell asleep reclined up on the headboard again. The ice-cold air from his fan blasted him right in the face, and nothing felt more like a perfect “good morning” before coffee got involved. He rubbed his hands up both of his arms, realizing he was feeling abnormally lighter than usual. One hand glided up his left arm, and it felt like Ford’s face left an imprint or something like that. 

He opened his eyes and all of last night came whooshing back. 

He felt tears kinda welling up in his eyes. But between all of the exhaustion and crying late last night (or early this morning, take your pick), nothing came out. A million and one firecrackers deep in his chest exploded like candy rocks in Mountain Dew. 

Stan remembered grabbing Ford’s shoulders like the past 40 years never even happened and how Ford even gripped him right back without trying to slug him. If his now fully (but noncaffeinated) awake brain knew any better, the old nerd might have wiped the mess from his face when he burst out crying, or did he just imagine that? After asking if Ford would ever not be mad at him, things _did_ start to get a little hazy. All of that talk took so much out of him, at least until the mini wrestling match. But Stan _really_ woke up all over again when their foreheads met after how many years. He perked up a little more awake now. This just felt a little too good. Stanley felt like a brother again! 

… or at least a good percentage of him did. 

He stretched his arms out wide. His bones crunched at least 15 times, and for the sake of dignity, let’s not discuss how many times his back cracked! Stan kinda regretted falling asleep sitting up, but with that old nerd cuddling up against his arm, it was worth it. 

But Stanford’s face wasn’t up against his bicep. 

Stanley dropped his hands, looking to his left. 

The green blanket laid beside him unoccupied. He remembered how putting it over Ford’s shoulders almost felt like hugging the guy. A tiny shiver went down his spine. They even bonked foreheads and roughhoused a little bit, but hugging the old genius felt a little too soon, if at all. 

He stretched his arms and legs out with a little groan. They cracked and snapped in response before falling back on the bed. Stanley still felt a million times lighter. He smacked his lips once, then twice. 

But didn’t Stanford want to talk to him about something serious this morning? 

But an even better question, why would the guy not want to wake up with him?! He did reset the alarm for 10:00 just to make sure Poindexter got the sleep _he_ needed! 

Stan shouldn’t be too surprised. 

And there laid (or really reclined) good ol’ Stanley Caryn “Cynical” Pines with his old man bite for the day. Leave it to the Sixer in his mind to jumpstart his cynicism even earlier than usual. 

He turned on his side and switched off the alarm before logging in his regular 8:00 AM alarm for tomorrow. The red 7:45 on the small rectangular black screen was a little blurry, or maybe that was just the sleep still in his eyes. But a folded piece of paper with Ford’s handwriting spelling out his name stood on top of the clock radio on its edges. 

> “Stanley, meet me at 11:30 at the disclosed location. I have drawn a map where you will find me. Please, feel free to bring a picnic as I am sure you will be hungry around then. 
> 
> We have much to discuss. 
> 
> — Stanford Pines” 

\+ 

“Doot-de-doot-doot-doot, coming down the stairs/Can’t believe I took a shower for that derp like it’s a…” Stan whispered to himself, hitting the last step, “Brother-date.” 

There is no way he was going to let Mabel hear that last part! 

So, he kinda took a rare long, hot morning shower and left the Mr. Mystery suit on the hanger. Tourists usually come around the afternoons on Thursdays anyway, so he had time for whatever Ford had planned. Stan even felt confident enough to slide into a trusty Hawaiian shirt over his usual tank top and jeans. He put on his lucky gold chain for size as if he needed the extra juju after last night. Did he? He still couldn't tell. 

Stanley walked into the kitchen, passing by a curiously charred square in the counter next to the sink. 

He immediately shrugged it off. 

But the better question was what to make them for this picnic lunch. If only he had some jelly beans to satisfy his fellow senior citizen! 

He poured some coffee instead, a few good sips rushing blood up to the ol’ noggin. 

Huh, the kids didn’t even look like they were up or around yet. 

Stan even looked under the table, making sure Dipper wasn’t making weird sigils with the off-brand Cheerios again. 

That was always the first clue. 

🎶We be blanchin’ on a plane/We be blanchin’ straight to France/We got blanchin’... 🎶 

Oh boy. 

Stanley followed that dumb song into the gift shop. 

He stood in the doorway, feeling he should be crossing his arms if he wasn’t holding his coffee mug right now. But Soos, Mabel, her two weird friends, and -- wait, do pigs know how to dance? Waddles kinda looked like he was dancing to that weird-ass song right in the middle of his beloved gift shop. Stan rolled his eyes up to the ceiling with a quiet sigh. 

🎶Hey!/Kids are we blanchin’?/Yeah, we still blanchin’ 🎶 

At least Soos was holding the broom... 

… the wrong way. 

He kept rapping into the handle like it was a microphone or something and swinging it around in all directions. The brush end started nearing the postcard rack, and oh, did _this_ look like a disaster waiting to happen! 

Stan lightly jogged for it, grabbing the rack with his free hand. 

“Good mornin’, Mr. Pines!” Soos brightened up, moving the broom away from the postcards through the air between them. Stan got the bristly end of the broom right in the kisser. “Oo-oops, heh, sorry, dude.” 

“Morning, Grunkle Stan!” 

Mabel ran up to him, hugging his leg. 

He bit back an even grin after the night he had last night. 

Eh, what the hell?! 

He was in a good mood today! 

Stan pretended to shake her off his leg a few times. She giggled as she held on like some kind of gooey octopus. Little pudgy hands kept gripping at his knee crease, and he honestly kinda melted for the first time since he first saw Shermie’s oldest granddaughter when she was just a day old. 

Mabel jumped backward off his shin, turning and presenting her friends who kept looking at him with wide eyes like he was Michael Myers or something. 

“You remember my friends, Grenda and Candy!” 

“Right, uh, the gumdrop and, uh,” he drew out, pointing down at Grenda as she kept gaping right up at him, “Brunhild! Say, where’s your Viking helmet?” 

Stanley laughed at his own joke, taking another sip of his coffee. 

All three girls looked at each other confused. 

“I … I don’t even know how to respond to that,” Grenda shrugged. 

“Eh, never mind. Where’s your brother?” 

“At Wendy’s watching movies. We girls are taking over the shack!” Mabel shouted, victoriously fist-pumping the air. “ _I_ like to call it Mabel-palooza!” 

“I thought we were going to call it Grencanbel-palooza!” 

Mabel turned, looking at Gumdrop. 

“Too many syllables,” she turned back around as he took another sip, spitting between her braces directly on his knees. Stan resisted wiping at his jeans. It was usually better to make her feel more secure about her teeth, even if she didn’t show that she didn’t care. 

Mabel lifted the sleeves of her bright pink Mabel-palooza sweater into the air. 

“Anyway! There will be makeovers and facials and mani-pedis and positive affirmation hour and polaroid-taking and many, many, MANY stuffed animals! You should come, Grunkle Stan! We do not discriminate gender at Mabel-palooza!” 

“I, uh...” he reached his free hand to the back of his neck, not even wanting to drop the tiniest clue. “I have somewhere I need ta be, so, Soos.” 

He turned to his handyman picking at the brush side of the broom like a chimp looking for fleas, nearly getting the pointy end up his nose. 

“Glagh! Soos,” Stan grabbed the broom and leaned it up against the counter behind this weird gopher-human who liked him a little too much, “Wouldja close up shop? I’ll take care of the register in a few minutes.” 

Mabel gasped. 

“Soos!” Mabel leaped up onto the cashier counter and meeting his handyman eye-to-eye. “You _need_ to join us for Mabel-palooza! In fact, I will start you with your first affirmation for the day!” she grabbed his cheeks with her tiny hands, looking him directly in the eye.“I believe I am as bright as glittery stickers and as sweet as cupcakes!" 

Soos blushed underneath her little chubby fingers. 

Stanley rolled his eyes. 

“Aw, little dude! You’re da best!” 

“But that's only the beginning! Come on, girls!” she leaped off the counter and started for the Employees Only exit. Mabel stopped to victoriously puff out her chest as she held the door open for her friends, who already disappeared into the living room. 

“Hey, pumpkin. Before you go extra crazy on your Mabel-palooza-thing, is there anything edible in the fridge that isn’t covered in glitter right now?” 

“I think there’s bread and cheese and, of course, that gross canned meat you seem to like so much.” 

“Mabel-palooza 2015!” she shouted, running into the living room. 

Stanley struggled from lighting up with Soos standing right beside him. 

Poindexter was going to love this. 

* 

He was nervous. 

Stanford slowly balled his hands into fists, hearing his knuckles crunch. 

Doing this would be more challenging than determining, however exhaustedly, whether or not to topple into Stanley's bedroom like he did last night! He was honestly planning on divulging everything about Bill Cipher, the objective behind the Trans-Universal Gateway, everything! This did not feel right at all! 

… and yet it felt appropriate all at the same time. 

He paced back and forth in front of the bunker door, not even comprehending how he was here of all places. 

The last time he saw this tree was out of the corner of his eye as he ran for dear life in the opposite direction. Papers kept flying off of McGucket’s clipboard directly into his face as Fidds accumulated more speed and started whizzing past him. Ford’s heart rate kept pulsing higher and higher until practically to the point of a heart attack. Another paper got him directly in the face but, he could hear nothing else but his blood pressure in his ears and the tools clattering around in his toolbox. "I will never come back here ever again!" kept chanting over and over in his head. 

That is until he required a place to stay through the imminent Apocalypse. 

He would even be strangely satisfied with sitting on the spiral staircase if Stanley and himself needed extra privacy. There _was_ the perpetual emergency switch that closed the door but left the main entry wide open. Either way, he would even hear Fiddleford whistling an appreciative Tennessean whistle in his head, remembering when they walked down those stairs together for the first time. 

Ford ran a hand through his hair, grabbing at a clump at the back of his head. 

His lifted arm still felt as if it was floating on a cloud ship from Dimension 280@&. Everything about his person felt so many mountains lighter than it did last night it almost felt wrong. 

He remembered waking up six hours ago to pitch black. 

There was no means of knowing what time it was or even how long he had slept. All he _did_ know was that Stanford Pines finally slept one of the most reparative sleeps he has had in a long time! It felt _so_ good it almost felt wrong. He sensed a fleshy something under the warmer side of his face before he blinked his eyes open. But it took some doing to open his right eye. He could have sworn his eyelashes on his left eye appeared to be almost frozen to his face. Ford immediately smiled to himself, discerning where _and_ when he was. 

He softly squeezed Stanley’s arm a little tighter. 

‘Not now, Marilyn,’ the old knucklehead sleepily mumbled. ‘I’m sleepin’.’ 

He looked up, dragging his five o’clock shadow up Stan’s craggy bicep. 

An older version of Stanley never looked more peaceful yet world-weary as he slept sitting up against the headboard. His mouth was ajar, a soft snore rocking along with his lightly moving chest hair peeking out of his tank top. Ford nearly fell asleep all over again just from watching Stanley's almost metronomic-like breath with a smile on his face. 

But with the way Stan bitched and moaned about aches and pains, he felt himself rearrange the knucklehead down to a healthier incline to reduce any possible injury or cramps in his neck. 

“I love you, Ley, you old blockhead,” almost whispered right out of him. 

It was too soon, but it just felt simultaneously good and yet a little wrong at the same time. 

Ford sat down on the grass in front of the door, dropping his head backward on the fake wood. Metal clanged against metal. He grinned at the comparison. 

Last night somehow felt satisfying and yet nothing like he used to imagine it to be. 

The Stanford from the other side of the portal fantasized about over-explaining to Stanley every detail and story-point for his first five years on the run. But going over it for so long started to get depressing than motivating, and, as the decades turned in and out (and sometimes upside down), just thinking of the imaginary scenario began to feel so inconsequential. 

It all came down to three simple words. 

“I missed you” never felt more suitable. 

Stanford happily sighed up through the canopy and into the bright blue summer sky. 

He narrowed his eyes, reclining against the door. His arms even crossed behind his head, taking in all the tree tips and zigzag-shaped pine tree branches. The warm stink of spruce leaves even smelled even more pungent with his eyes mostly closed. 

Yep, this felt just too good. 

Ford was not planning on jeopardizing this feeling with the probability of another dropping shoe this time. Bill Cipher and the currently well-hidden rift tried to glide their way into this newfound sense of thoughtlessness. He immediately fought it all off, choosing this newly obtained mackle. 

Nothing else matters right now but Stanley and himself. 

But nothing else _also_ matters more than Stanley and himself ensuring the safety of Sherman's grandkids. That _did_ require so many topical admissions on his part _and_ topical admissions that would sink his self-worth straight down into the subterranean laboratory below him. 

The grass in front of him ruffled. 

He jumped to his feet, gripping his waist underneath his trench coat instead of the holster at his hip. If it was Stanley, he did _not_ deserve a welcome at gunpoint after taking an ironically welcoming fist in front of the gateway! 

Stan stopped feet away from the bunker door. 

Between the Hawaiian shirt and the gaudy chain around his neck, he could not have looked more like a younger semblance of his personality Stanford once knew. 

The old knucklehead just stood there looking back at him, and so cautiously, Ford felt something in his chest ache. 

He watched Stanley’s face looking right back at him. 

Somehow a little hope started to brighten across his face. 

Even Stan looked like something slowly melted off him as well. 

This whole idea _still_ felt like a good one, but something did _not_ entirely feel right. 

But blaming himself or pessimism was too easy, and of course, blaming Stanley was just a disaster waiting to happen. It was faultless to feel just a little awkward after everything they had said to one another after such an intimate night like last night, and yet not all at the same time! 

Stan lifted his hands in the air, holding a plastic bag in one hand and a blanket in the other. 

“Got the grub.” 

Stanley made food for him as well?! 

Ford felt himself gape right back at the knucklehead. 

Stan couldn’t help but grin a little bit at that big dopey look on his twin’s face. 

He closed his mouth. 

The kindness behind the act was something special. But with almost knowing _this_ version of Stanley, Ford believed he would have provided lunch for himself alone. He brought it on himself by never disclosing his current relationship with Dimension 46’\ food. 

He opened and closed his mouth all over again. 

A pang of nerves twitched painfully, realizing he would have to harvest a little of this lunch into his body just out of good manners. It _was_ rather admirable of the old knucklehead to think of him! Besides, he did _not_ want the old knucklehead to worry about his eating problems on top of everything else more Gravity Falls-related! 

“Thanks, Stan.” 

Stanley started walking forward like the old nerd's words broke some magic spell. 

He felt himself finally breathe at a neutral pace as he helped spread the dark blue plaid blanket out. 

“I hope you know, Stanley, that, uh," Ford dropped his end of the blanket down on the grass. He stepped forward onto the rough material, almost feeling his feet floating underneath him. He sat down and crisscrossed his legs, watching Stan sit down beside him and crossing one ankle over the other. "I … I have not been eating 46'\ dimension-appropriate food because I am kind of frightened of throwing up after having not eaten sustenance from this dimension in so long!" 

“Well, you’re gonna hafta break in that ol’ iron tub you have there," Stanley leaned over to knock on his stomach. Stanford could not help but chuckle, and affectionately shoved his hand away, “because _I_ got something I _know_ will make you happy!” 

Stan was usually serious when he pulled out that sing-song tone in his lower register like that. He watched Stanley sit up straighter, discarding two thick paper-wrapped packs of something, two bags of chips, and two Pitt Colas. 

Ford smelled the warmed bread, the melted cheese, the over-salted packaged ham, the soft sulfuric scent of an egg, and all the scented combinations in between. 

His stomach groaned, and his mouth watered at the same time. 

"Great Newton!" he almost purred, feeling the biggest dorkiest grin across his face as he unwrapped the sandwich. “I have _not_ smelled one of these since high school!” 

Stanford apprehensively looked back up at Stanley, still holding the sandwich. 

There was just so much baggage attached to that cursed phrase. But after last night, was it all just water under the bridge or a more proverbial past haunting dictating his present? He still could not tell. 

Stan looked just as worried back at him. 

Things would never be 100% fixed, will they? 

Stanford let those two words go, for the time being, lifting the grilled spam and egg and cheese in front of his mouth. He felt himself sniff it even more indulgently than before, feeling both tempted _and_ terrified to eat it. 

“Geez, do the two of you wanna get a room or something?!” 

“No need.” 

He took one more sniff before sitting it down. 

Stanley rolled his eyes, looking down at the little spread between them and feeling a little too proud of himself. 

“Ah, heh,” he grunted with a tiny grin, shoving the plastic bag he brought the food into the old genius’s polydactyly, “I... I guess if you need a barf bag...” 

“Thanks, bro!” 

Ford sat up almost as straight as last night when Stanley first threw his blanket over his shoulders. He explored Stan’s older-looking face, the old knucklehead slowly looking just as startled and pleased as he did. The ends of his lips twitched, resisting yet another massive smile. 

He still barely knew how he was able to look the knucklehead in the face once more. He felt like he wanted to shake his head in total amazement, not even comprehending how he got so lucky. But looking Stanley directly in the eye would still take some time, and that was OK! 

The forest felt uncharacteristically still around him. 

A few birds tweeted from a nearby tree, and something scampered into a bush. If Ford prayed, he would have prayed that it was a squirrel or a rabbit or something just a little more normal for once. He would have even settled for a lone gnome as they are far more dangerous in groups. 

They kept looking at each other a little longer than expected. 

“So, uh, w-well?” Stanley nervously looked down at his food, furrowing his bushy eyebrows down on his frames. If Ford knew any better, there was a little pink on the knucklehead’s cheeks. “D-do you want ta start saying things i-if it helps stop the weird around the kids?” 

“Yes, well,” Stanford smiled down at the grilled cheese-egg-spam sandwich, still in complete awe over the kind gesture. It _did_ feel like they were brothers again, even if an undecipherable something kept looming over the top of the feeling, “I suppose I could start at the beginning...” 

He nodded over at Stan shoving at least a ¼ of his sandwich into his mouth, the beginnings of affectionately busting his chops charging through his synapses. 

“...as your favorite movie instructs.” 

“I swear, Si-ah-Poindexter if you tell anyone “The Sound of Music” is my favorite movie, _I_ will deck _you_!” 

Stanley winced at his own words. Ford even felt his tall posture straighten even higher, embarrassed _and_ disappointed at the reference of his prior but well-meant actions at the time. 

All of this was going to take, exactly, that. Time! 

“B-before I start explaining myself, Stanley, I… I just,” Ford heard his voice shake from a distance. He slowly opened the tab of the Pitt Cola can and flicked the metal tab back and forth like it could keep his hands busy, along with the bonus of wetting his suddenly dry throat. “Y-you will not like what you are going to hear about the stupid and dangerous things I never realized I was doing. But if _we_ work as a team, we can undo the damage done and save Gravity Falls together!” 

“I found myself hitting a roadblock after six years here in Gravity Falls. I wanted to find the exact source of where these anomalies were coming from!” Stanford took a defeated breath down to his sandwich and picked it up. The squishy yet edible material felt so foreign yet familiar against his finger pads. He nibbled at it with his incisors, not even caring how ridiculous and almost rabbit-like he may look. The taste in his mouth still felt foreign and nostalgically heavenly. The strong mustard started to exhale up his nasopharynx. “Around that same time, I discovered a small cave here in the woods containing strange hieroglyphics of an entity who holds unending knowledge…” 

*

“... I was horrified at what I saw beyond the rift, so I deactivated the Trans Universal Gateway. In its stead, I constituted Project Mentem, a machine that bio-electrically encrypts thoughts. I concluded I could intercept Bill Cipher from invading my mind forever, but it seems I could not intercept my mind from myself. I ceased sleeping, terrified of what would materialize in my dreams, although I knew I was relatively safe. I was so traumatized by what I might have provoked in bringing the Nightmare Realm into our dimension. I even stopped eating. I squandered my time exerting my paranoia into the journals. I _do_ know that now.” 

“B-before I sent the postcard—” 

“Heh, Ma?” 

Stanford’s throat felt so raw from talking so much. 

He still was not quite used to it despite having attempted to chat with many fascinating creatures on the other side of the rift, even with the multitude of language barriers. A hand reached the Pitt-Cola to his mouth, dripping a single drop onto his tongue. At least Stanley’s interruption provided a well-meant reprieve. It was also telling how Ford was not the only one presented with addresses and phone numbers either. 

He finally looked up, feeling a warm smile slide right up to his frames. 

“Ma.” 

He blinked back down at the minute progress of his colder sandwich in front of his knees. 

“I converted this old thing...” he rapped at the metal around the door. It echoed through the tree, and for a few quiet seconds, Stanford felt like he was about to jump at what could have responded right back, “into a fallout shelter, hid the journals as cleverly as I could, and sent you the postcard. I allowed myself to sleep for 5 hours the night before you got here. It was mostly dreamless, thank God! But I was _not_ kidding last night when I said I had never felt any clearer despite the paranoia in _and_ around me. And..." he heard himself draw out, his voice shaking somewhere in the elongation, "you know how the rest went.” 

He slammed his eyes shut. 

After hearing the story out of his mouth, Stanford (no middle name now) Pines was a real dope! 

His chin started trembling, feeling the tears collecting in the corners of his eyes. 

No, Stanford Pines is not a dope but a failure. The weight of that statement felt even heavier for the first time in 30 years. 

He covered his already downcast face. 

A woodpecker started pecking away at tree bark somewhere close by, a few more bird calls rising from another tree some yards away. Multiple different types of warm pine molded into a strange and yet wonderful aroma. He _really_ did take advantage of all of the beauty of this forest for those ten years, didn’t he? The forest felt close to peaceful and in a rare moment where someone was not screaming or a deadly creature running through it. 

The silence between them laid a little flimsy after all of the thickness a few days ago with the Cubitum Serpentibus. 

Stanley’s opinion of him may have lowered even deeper past his subterranean laboratory. 

He was not quite ready for the results. But it was nice to share some adult (although somewhat bitter) silence with the old knucklehead. 

“Hey, well...” 

Stanford felt himself wince, not even caring and yet caring what Stanley would have to say. 

“I always knew you were an idiot.” 

A sweating hand came down on his shoulder cap. He sat up straight all over again, discovering a sad and concerned-looking Stan looking back at him. There was just enough of that youthful “protect Sixer at all costs” look in his brown eyes, and Ford fought himself from smiling like a maniac. 

“But I also knew you were _my_ idiot, you knucklehead!” 

It was unfortunate timing for Stanley to bring in his comic defense mechanisms like this. 

He almost regretted saying anything, but his body felt even more weightless, although simultaneously full of persistent self-hatred. But Ford also felt confident if their situations coincided with one another (perish the thought!), he would be _more_ than happy to help with Stan’s predicament. Only _Sherman’s_ son would think of passing his children into Stanley’s care of all people! 

“You don’t hafta keep beating yourself up, Si-ah-Poindexter.” 

Stan’s fingers curled around his shoulder. 

He sighed a little jagged sound inward, looking back down to his knees. 

“I know,” he mumbled, slumping over a little along with the deflating feeling under his skin. But the sandwich enticed him from where it sat on top of its wrapping just in front of him. Ford could not help but grin at it in utter disbelief. “I know, Stanley.” 

“I-it will just take some time to get used to all of this, to get used to, well...” 

“Us.” 

“Us." 

The single word almost opened a lesser nocturnal floodgate in his tear ducts. 

“But I _additionally_ spent the past 30 years obsessing going over what I could have done differently in my research if I had been a different or better person with you by my side through the whole ordeal.” 

“Yeah,” cracked out of Stanley. “I know the feelin’'.” 

Ford raised his hand to Stan’s shoulder without looking up at him. 

“Well, at least you had that assistant-guy.” 

He chuckled. 

“Well, that assistant-guy did _not_ have your brand of sway over me. You always were my anchor, Ley. I hope that you would want to be my anchor again, that is...” he sheepishly looked up to bushy gray eyebrows practically merging with the equator of his lenses, “i-if you want to.” 

Stanley sniffed loud, Ford curling his fingers around the knucklehead’s shoulder. 

Something scampered into a bush nearby. He probably would have jumped if it was not for this calmest internal quiet, this mackle he had not felt in a very long time. Ford would have hated it if this mackle would somehow disappear, never wanting to be without it now. 

“So, when you say Bill Cipher, do you mean an upside-down Dorito wearing the Monopoly Man’s outfit?” 

“Heh, that’s the best description I’ve ever heard of him – wait, WHAT?!” 

Stanford shot back up fast, nearly getting woozy from the velocity. His fingers inched towards the plastic bag just in case if it was the smaller bits of sandwich finally sinking into his digestive tract. But he knew better. 

“H-how do you know that?!” Ford felt himself grab the lapels of Stan's Hawaiian shirt from a distance, leaning in towards him closer and closer. He knew he did not _have_ to react this way, but it felt just so natural as his pulse started to race even faster than the last time he was at the bunker’s doorway, “Ley, how do you know that?! Has he come back? _Did_ you shake his hand? _Did_ you make a deal with hi–” 

“Calm down, Poindexter...” and the hand on his shoulder graduated up onto his face. He almost felt tears in his eyes just from the brotherly touch, although there was also the fear of the blockhead having to deal with the terror that was Bill Cipher. Stanley could not have looked anymore like Filbrick and yet like himself at the same time as he looked right into his softly stern eyes. “I was _just_ the target, _not_ the dumb-dumb who caused it! Come on, buddy, breathe with me. In and out.” 

Stanford stared back into his face. 

He did not even realize his erratic breath. But he _did_ feel his chin start to shake, recognizing this horrible density of PTSD. Stanford wanted to cry, to rage, to...

“Y-your child enemy?” managed to hiccup between breaths. 

“In a minute, Stanford.” 

Stan released his face and gripped his shoulders instead. 

Birds called to one another from the branches overhead, his breath and heart rate slowly and yet instinctively synchronizing with Stanley’s. It felt so much like the times where Stan got so worked up over Crampelter, and one of the two options to calm him down was doing this or giving the guy some space. He felt like his cheeks were radiating a huge smile, looking directly back into the old knucklehead’s face. _He_ was taking care of _him_! 

“We good?” 

“We’re good, Stanley. N-now what is _this_ about your child,” Ford could not help but chuckle between his words, “enemy?” 

“It's not as funny as it sounds, Poindexter. Look,” Stan brought out his cellular phone with one hand, and after pushing a few buttons, a frightening tiny piglet-faced 10-year-old wearing what almost looked to be a gravity-defying English wig appeared on the screen. 

“Yeesh, fair enough.” 

Stanley grunted in agreement as he shoved the phone back into his pocket. 

“Anyway, the little pipsqueak has been a thorn in my side for a solid five years now," He dropped his hands down behind him on the blanket, leaning back on his weight as he started to cross one ankle over the other, “wh-when-whoa.” 

Stanley rolled and fell backward as if something spiraled from under one of his hands. 

“OW!” 

“What the h...” he reached under the blue plaid blanket and pulled out a 1/4 of a tree branch with tinier twigs attached to the top. 

Ford focused in on the side where it had broken off. It looked a little _too_ smooth for a strangely cylindrical piece of wood to off with age or, perhaps even wear. But there was a faint five-finger-like indentation pattern on the thicker part of the branch Stanley had facing him. 

“Oh no!” He swiftly jumped onto his feet, looking higher up at the “door handle”-like lever feet above the door itself, “Oh, no-no-no-no-no!” 

The tip had to have fallen off, the strange blunt slice upon the rest of the lever looking like no practical creature could have torn or bitten it off. 

Ford’s pulse hammered as he grabbed the back of his head. 

“Oh, this is bad, this is–” 

He toppled forward to the side of the bunker tree closest to him, promptly vomiting. 

His throat tried to clear itself, although hating the smell inside of it. Nothing could have made him feel more like the six-year-old who contracted the stomach flu on Stan and his birthday. Tears dripped out of his eyes as they did into the toilet of his childhood bathroom and into… 

Ford took a deep breath and looked through the trees ahead, their blurry shapes much more preferable than the tips of his shoes. There was _no_ way he was going to look back down! It would only conjure up the sensation in his throat all over again. 

‘Hey, Sixer?’ came through their bedroom door several hours later. Ma had him holed up in their bedroom and put Stanley on the couch for the next week. The separation felt worse than being sick as he laid sprawled out on the top bunk, managing to turn his head towards the door. ‘Ma says you should try putting something in your stomach.’ 

Three saltines shuffled through the bottom crack of the door one after the other like Stan’s G.I. Joes. 

He finally smiled for the first time in hours. 

“Hey, Sixer – eugh.” 

A hand rested around his scapula, and Stanford could have burst out crying. 

“Just, uh,” Stanley reached his arm over the top of his shoulder, and a can of Pitt Cola stared him straight in the face. He bit his bottom lip smiling, “J-just swish and spit.” 

“Thank you, Stanley.” 

He followed instructions as he wobbled back onto the blanket. But his softer heart rate was still hammering. Ford set the can back down and looked back up at the lever completely stumped. 

This must imply something got in! But the possibility of age was also just as plausible. 

‘Stanford Pines and Fiddleford McGucket, you will pay for this!’ the shapeshifter prophesied as he started to freeze up in the cryogenic chamber. Those were the last words he heard before they both started sprinting like chickens with their heads cut off. 

“Uh, Ford?” drew out from his right side, “ _What_ are we looking at exactly?” 

“Stanley, where’s that little knob of a stick you were just holding?” 

The smooth grooved handle dropped into his hand. 

Stanford walked backward off the blanket and took a running start, and leaped up past the door. His free arm hugged the tree as he lightly stepped up one tiny ingrown spruce root and then another, feeling like he was in his 20s once more. Ford quietly grinned to himself, feeling even more alive even in the face of a possible concussion. 

“Stanford Pines, WHAT in the name of P.T. Barnum do you think you're doing?!” 

“It’s a portion of the lever!” He shouted back down while attempting to connect the top of the handle onto the rest of it. There was no sign of rust or decay, so it must _have_ been cut off _and_ neatly too! Ford shook his head completely stumped, stepping back down the spruce stems and jumping down onto solid ground. 

Wooziness tilted the whole forest around him, but it really might have been vice versa. 

“W-whoa–” 

“Easy there, Indiana Jones,” Stanley grumbled, grabbing his shoulder to steady him. 

He took a deep shaking breath, ensuring he would not vomit again. 

“It means...” Ford indignantly turned on his foot to look his brother in the eyes. “It implies something went _in_ , which implies something may have come _out_! Or the tree is just getting old.” he shrugged with his “I’m trying to be humorous and matter-of-fact at the same time” voice. “I cannot entirely tell yet.” 

He stared up at this strange abnormality, toppling backward on his heels. What could have struck the lever off _and_ so smoothly? Was it something inhuman? Man-made?! He still could not entirely tell, and he hated not knowing. 

“Ooh, I do _not_ want to back down there to check, Ley!” Stanford turned, practically discovering Stanley’s jaw on the dark blue picnic blanket underneath the both of them. He kept shaking his head and alternating between looking at himself and where the bunker door would be on the tree. But if it were not for the dire situation right in front of him, he would have almost chuckled at his state of bewilderment, “This is bad.” 

“Why, what’s down there?” 

“A very pissed-off shapeshifter.” 

“And _why_ is it pissed-off exactly?” sounded like it had the foresight that it was kind of his fault. 

He sighed down to the plaid pattern on the blanket. 

“B-because...” sheepishly mumbled down at his shoes, “because I tested on it since birth.” 

“Yup, sounds about right." 

Stanley groaned. Stanford noted a faint shadowy shape just out of the corner of one eye, crossing the navy blanket towards the door. 

"Well, come on, then!” 

He felt his jaw nearly drop onto the picnic blanket, discovering Stanley standing in front of him and staring at the tree. The back of his red and yellow-patterned Hawaiian shirt against the overhead sun nearly blazed into his retinas. But the knucklehead scanned the invisible perimeter and knocked his way down to the not-quite tree root. 

Clink. 

Clink. 

“I’m pretty sure I can wedge this open somehow!” Ley called out over his shoulder. 

Clink. 

Each clang got even louder and hollower. 

“Oh boy, _this_ is gonna hurt.” 

Stanley squatted down on his calves, gripping the bottom of the “tree”, and attempted to pry it upwards. 

But the fact he could surmise the shape of the partition without actually seeing it _was_ pretty impressive. 

Stanford felt his mouth close with a tiny smirk as he crossed his arms over his chest. 

Eh, he would let the guy try to figure it out first. 

“Hhhhyyyukkkk.” 

“Hrrrmmmmpphhh.” 

Stan kept trying to force it open, his meaty triceps bulging every which direction. He kept leaning further and further backward against his calves, and it almost looked like he was about to fall over. Again. It looked like Stanley had more balance than he gave him credit. But no matter how much he might have been unconsciously showing off his arm strength, nothing budged. 

Ford raised his fist to his mouth, softly clearing his throat. 

“Um, Stanley?” 

“Not right now, Poindexter,” Ley grunted over his shoulder, “Kinda busy.” 

He rolled his eyes up to the early afternoon sky with an affectionate sigh. 

Knucklehead. 

Ford walked around the tree without a word to the contrary, avoiding the pool of his own sick. He felt his spine reach up even straighter, discovering the compartment containing the surveillance equipment and the third journal open. His pulse nearly burst straight out of his chest, feeling fireworks on top of fireworks discharge in his nervous system. The cubicle looked so dull without the shiny polydactyly, but of course, it _would_ be gone! 

How would Stanley have finished repairing the gateway without it or Dipper discovering his summer-bound albeit dangerous hobby? 

But a shock is still a shock. 

He shook his head, getting a grip on himself. 

He reached into the hollowed-out chamber and pressed the emergency entrance button sitting on the floor behind the surveillance operator. 

That familiar loud buzz bombinated through the whole forest. 

The tree dropped down in front of him, and the steps thumped out from the soil underneath. The metallic door hissed up in its final and almost comical punctuation-like sound. He did not even realize he closed his eyes with a little smile. 

Goosebumps prickled all over his unfortunate tattoos, almost overlooking how he used to acknowledge that noise to be the most welcoming sound in the world back before triangular dream demons and months-long insomnia spells. But that was also when he used to be a variant of himself he legitimately liked, the careless yet studious geek with the 12 PhDs. and unafraid to learn everything about the preternatural world around _and_ beyond him. 

A few tears sprang into his tear ducts like hatchets. 

“Ha! Got it!” shouted from the other side of the tree. 

“Hey, Poindexter! Where’d ya go?!” 

He walked back around the fake metal tree, pressing his lips together. 

“Hey, Si-ah-Poindexter, check it out,” Stan grabbed his shoulder and yanked him around to the front. He wrapped that same arm around his shoulder blades and clapped the outside of his opposite trench coat sleeve. That little smile grew massive. “ _I_ got it open!” 

The knucklehead looked so proud of himself, Stanford could not bring himself to tell him the truth. 

He wordlessly clapped Stanley’s ar right back. 

Decades of dust and rusted metal (from _this_ dimension) laid over that once familiar smell of subterranean soil and the strange synthetic yet faintly metallic scent of UFO parts. He took a deep, shaky breath as he stared into the fake metal bark, remembering how that smell used to be associated with such hope and accomplishment and self-fulfillment. 

But there was still a very angry shapeshifter down there. 

“Oh boy, we got the doctor appointment of ‘66 all over again.” 

And Stanley was tugging his arm as if he had frozen to the picnic blanket or something. But Stanford tried to shake it off, the memory of a pair of 10-year-old boys going in for their annual physicals floating to his frontal lobe. One end of his mouth could not help but quirk up. 

“Stanley! Dr. Holtzmann’s hands were _always_ cold! But you never seemed to mind, and you still do not seem to mind, M-Mr. …” and he looked down, discovering his thick black boots walking underneath him as they angled toward the first spiral step, “I Will Keep an Ice-Cold Fan Going All Night and Not Get the Flu!” 

Stanley was making him feel like he had control all over again. 

A little weight fell off his shoulders. 

“Heh, this is _totally_ like a reverse treehouse!” 

Stanley stepped down the first step like it was nothing and turned around to look back at him. But Ford stood at the top of the stair, sensing his whole body freeze up. He looked down the staircase and took yet another shaky breath, noting how the last few steps fell into a blackness that looked way too much like the endless darkness on the other side of the activated gateway. 

“Almost wish we were kids again to _really_ enjoy this! 'Member how we were always jealous every time we saw a treehouse on TV?” 

“I …” shook right out. 

Stanford closed his eyes in the same direction and cleared his throat. 

“Y-yes, Stanley," he opened his eyes, feeling a tinier smile stretch across his face, “I remember.” 

“Look, Ford...” Ley shrugged as he sank his bushy eyebrows nearly down to the middle of his lenses. He pressed his lips together so tight there was barely a crease between them. The old knucklehead looked so protective and concerned and yet so much like Filbrick all at the same time, he did not know whether to smirk or burst out crying. “If you can’t bring yourself ta go down, just don’t. I’ll go check it out for ya!” 

“You wouldn’t know how to get to the control room and access the panels, knucklehead.” 

“Well, I _did_ pretty well with that monster of a portal down in the basement!" Stanley leaned in towards him and nudged his elbow into the front of his ribs. "Thanks for the manual, by the way.” 

“Yes, fair, but...” Ford sighed up to the summer sky, feeling a little cornered. If the Shape Shifter had thawed out and Stan went down there by himself, the knucklehead would be in more danger than _he_ was. But if the Shape Shifter had thawed out and he went down there by _himself_ , he would die at the drop of a trench coat! 

“Y-you would need back up regardless, but...” he reached his arm out, not even knowing if his hand was shaking as it clapped down on Stanley’s bare elbow, “I appreciate the sentiment, bro.” 

Stanley lit up like they were about to hit the high seas. 

A boot shook as it descended the first step and another. 

He turned a flashlight on in his coat pocket. A little film over the lens killed two birds with one stone. One becoming a decent detracting light source from using the electrical system, and the other compensating as some yet to be profiled bioluminescent creature for Experiment #210 to be distracted by when the imminent moment came. He stepped his other foot down on the same step Stanley was still standing on as he looked around the manmade half cavern a little amazed. 

They silently looked at each other. 

The knucklehead grinned as if a lightbulb appeared over his head. 

“I could _totally_ make this into something for the shack! Picture it, Poindexter!” Stanley wrapped an arm around him with one hand and scanned the air in a marquee-like gesture with the other. “A slide down into hell itself with just enough of my creations pinned to the walls. Ridiculous _and_ a little scary! Just like Splash Mountain at Disney World!” 

He rolled his eyes, and for a moment, it was almost as if those conditions he gave Stan the night he returned barely existed. 

His other foot went down another step and then alternating down to yet another. 

But they existed. 

“Or… I…” 

Stanford looked at Stanley, who was simultaneously turning toward him as they stood on yet another step together. Somehow, the monozygous recognition is still apparently intact. He almost wanted to chuckle a little bit. But the old blockhead progressively looked even more worried as they stood two steps away from the foot of the stair. 

“Oh.” 

Stan sank his darker shaded red and yellow printed shoulders almost as if he had deflated right in front of his eyes, and the conditions were _right_ there in the few inches between them. But Stanford still did not regret listing them for the world! Perhaps it was _in_ the way he delivered them that was unfair and being so fueled by years of exhausted anger and yet total joy all at the same time. 

Ley had to have known they were not entirely unreasonable! 

But if a man _could_ raise himself from the dead... 

“Stanley, let’s just, uh,” Ford nervously swallowed, not even knowing how to condense all of these paradoxical emotions before having to take care of the Experiment #210 business, “L-let’s just take all of this one day at a time, OK?” 

“All right.” 

He heard himself breathe in deep a little more smoothly, walking down the last few steps. 

Stanley puffed his chest out a little and fearlessly strode ahead of him right through the door into the fallout shelter. Stanford wanted to burst out crying and yet laugh at Stan’s enduring over-compensating attitude and yet smile like the person he was when this place used to be a source of knowledge than paranoia all at the same time. Self-hatred just rang even louder in his ears instead as that empty feeling grew a little more. 

Stanford entered his old laboratory base anyway. 

"Hey, Poindexter,” echoed from inside the dark bomb shelter, “Got that light?” 

“G-got it,” he took the flashlight out of his pocket and walked deeper inwards. One hand instinctively darted out for the wall, finding the light switch a little too easy in the dark. His other hand switched off the flashlight. Experiment #210 could not have _possibly_ known the way to this room! He drew his hand back into his pocket, not even realizing it was shaking and the quick hitch in his steady breathing. 

“You OK, buddy?” 

Something warm came down on the top of his shoulder, and Stanford almost leaped right out of his skin like the Taractylys tribe from Dimension 1556-D during mating season. He went straight for his holster this time, looking before he shot. 

Stanley had a good grip on his arm, and he could not help but bark a little nervous laugh. 

“I... I apologize for that, Ley.” he sighed out, shaking his head as he looked around this old and dusty room. It seemed relatively untouched, but it also seemed almost ancient compared to the last time he had seen it. When _did_ it start to look so old?! “I-it’s just strange seeing my Apocalyptic paranoia with sober eyes now.” 

“God!” he heard himself groan out, sitting on the cot and breathing in many Dimension 46’\\-specific dust bunnies. They tickled without much of a sneeze. A hand rose to grip a clump of hair on the back of his head as he closed his eyes. “I _really_ hate myself right now!” 

“Hey, you did what you felt you had ta do, buddy.” 

Warm stale air blew across his face, and a few more dust bunnies flew onto his closed eyelids. 

“We _all_ do some weird-ass things when we’re scared. Hell, once _I_ had ta eat my way out of a car trunk with my hands _and_ legs tied up!” 

A door squeaked open from somewhere on the right side of the room. 

“Whoa, nice stock you got here, Mr. 12 PhD.s!” 

Ford opened his eyes. Stanley stood in front of the open doors of his weaponry cabinet, swinging around the morning star like it was his cherished detention paddle ball. 

“You could _really_ sell some of these for really great prices on the internet right now!” 

“Stanley!” He shot off the mattress. “ _Please_ put that back! It’s dangerous!” 

If Stanford Pines had known any better, but he sounded a little like his father (or, at least, the father Filbrick was to him) between the dust bunnies hellbent on clogging his throat or genetics alone. 

“As if I didn’t know,” the knucklehead indignantly mumbled, placing the morning star back on its hook and closing the doors. 

Ford rolled his eyes as he turned back around to face the open main door. The surprise of where and when he was struck his nerves like lightning bolts. He slowly spun around in a half-circle, almost looking at a panorama of the front part of this awful room built out of eradicating his life's work and paranoia and fear and sleep deprivation. His eyes took in every shelving unit and safety measure as far as the pantry section (which even _he_ went as far as to admit now that living until 2060 might have been a _little_ presumptuous on his part). 

Cold air ran across his right arm. 

He lifted his hands to his elbows, attempting to warm himself. 

“Uh, Ford?” 

“Yes, Stanley?” 

“What does it mean if a porthole labeled Caution: Stay Out is wide open?” 

“WHAT?” 

Stanford whipped around to the back wall, and his stomach gurgled loud up to his throat. He felt his body shoot forward to the nearest canister, cleaning his intestines out onto a bunch of unsuspecting caterpillars. 

“Damn it,” he murmured into the empty bin. 

“You alright, Poindexter?” 

Something warm dropped on his scapula as he stood back up, retrieving a handkerchief from his coat pocket and wiping his mouth. 

“Yes, I’m better now. Thank you.” 

Stanley’s hand clapped back down as if in reply. 

“WAIT A MINUTE!” he bellowed, carefully twirling around and staring at the porthole on the back wall. The map of Gravity Falls laid crumpled on the floor beside it. 

A foreign, high-pitched sound started buzzing from an undecipherable location, but it did not appear as if it came from anything in his or the bunker’s possession. 

“Gahk, Sixer, my hearing aid!” 

“Heh, sorry,” Ford clapped the knucklehead’s arm with one hand and turned on the flashlight inside of his pocket with the other. He quietly groaned as he slowly gravitated towards the tunnel, dreading and yet kind of looking forward to the puzzle-like security room, which a young version of himself once considered his best invention so far. 

“Well, since _you_ insisted,” Stanford felt his lips purse as he glanced back at Stanley, “come on, knucklehead.” 

“I feel like I’m going to regret this,” grumbled out from behind him. 

He bent his 57-year-old knees down onto the compacted soil, hearing them crack the whole way down. 

It was hard not to notice a few loud pops and cracks right behind him as well. 

Ford felt a small smile slide up his face. 

But emotional exhaustion started wearing down on his shoulders. There was something about feeling so youthful and yet old in these metal walls all at the same time! But these metal walls that were his and yet _not_ his felt just as ghostly as his recently dusted-off memory palace; it almost felt like he was walking through a waking dream. 

Perhaps the work left him before he did. So really, Stanford Pines had very little in this dimension (minus the articles and papers with his name in the byline), save for Stanley and perhaps Sherman’s grandkids if they wished it. He shuddered, not knowing if it came from the cooler climate of the tunnel and this indecipherable something hanging in _and_ around his body. 

Another disembodied pair of hands and knees kept crunching down on the dirt behind him. 

Stanley started breathing a little heavier. 

He scuffled down the few feet it took to get into the security room, remembering how Fidds used to sneak one of his shoes off in the early days. Once Stanford recognized the cold tile underneath his usually thin and holey sock, he would look over at Fidds, and the knucklehead would be smiling the biggest shit-eating grin as he dangled his loafer in the air by their laces. But that was before things got so dangerous and before it felt like Fiddleford, however reasonably in hindsight, started resenting him even more vehemently by the day. 

A palm and its opposite knee alternated back down with a soft crunch. 

He paused just a few steps away from the opening, feeling Ley's body heat and even heavier breathing coming to a standstill behind him. 

“Ah...ah...CHOO!” 

Ford gritted his teeth, feeling the moisture on the back of his pants legs. Experiment #210 _might_ have heard that! But it was frozen! Of _course_ , it was frozen! 

“Stanley,” he gently called over his shoulder, a tiny echo reverberating through the small passage. 

“Sorry ‘bout that, Sixer.” 

“It’s fine, but at the possibility of accidentally setting off the booby trap, I need you to find...” 

He drew the escape figures 1 and 3 down into the soil beside him, sensing the knucklehead’s calefaction leaning in closer toward him and looking around his arm. 

“These sigils on the floor; I will grab the other two. But, Ley, do _not_ panic or step on the triangle and circle tile in the middle of the room. That will set it off and...” Ford chuckled, slowly looking ahead through the mouth of the dark tunnel and feeling _surprisingly_ calm given the circumstances, “is something old-timers like _us_ should not even attempt to venture although I am quite proud of this measure.” 

“Hey, don’t worry about _me_ , Nerdzilla. I trust you.” 

Stanford felt his eyes blink wide open and a tiny shudder down his spine. A few more sharp and hot tears stung the corners of his wide eyes. 

He almost wondered if Stanley reacted the same way. 

Ford climbed into the security room with a Charley Horse searing down his left leg. He instinctively stepped off to the right of the tunnel opening, exhilarated and yet a little disgruntled to have both of his shoes on. A few softer tears streamed out of his tear ducts, gazing around his side of the room and recalling how Fiddleford naturally took to taking the other side. Both of them successfully missed that center tile _every_ time. 

He smiled to himself and shook his leg, waiting for the pain to subside. 

A huffing noise breathed across his right shoulder and echoed off the metallic walls. 

“Geez, Sixer.” 

Stanley’s loafers slapped down on the dark green tile. 

They rang seconds after impact. 

Stanford shook his head to the right side of the security room, expecting to find Fidds grinning back at him and dangling his left shoe in the air. But Stan and his bright red and yellow Hawaiian shirt stuck out like a sore thumb against the green-gray room. He looked around a little wide-eyed and uncertain, practically taking in each colorless tile. 

A little dopamine rushed through his brain, taking the little look as a compliment. 

But it _did_ feel strange that Fiddleford was not in the room with him. 

And they _really_ were friends at one point! 

Something punched him directly in the stomach. 

Stanford never even discerned he had never fully mourned losing Fidds! A few tears stung the corners of his eyes, and self-hatred grew in his intestines. He _did_ become so immersed in paranoia, he could not _even_ comprehend the simple advice of a _friend_ and colleague! What kind of a person mentally brushes off someone else and never feels the repercussions at any point over 40 years?! 

“You _really_ like to outdo yourself...” echoed from the right side of the room. 

Ford looked over to Stan shaking his head back at him, glinting a little sarcasm in the corner of one eye. 

“B-but then you always did.” 

“S-so do you,” Ford grinned right back, “i-in your way,” 

Stanley looked like he froze to the spot, very obviously beaming. 

“B-between the way you presented me to the kids and your custodian when I came through the Gateway,” Stanford felt his smile uncharacteristically grow, gazing down to a tile between his shoes and immediately identifying its sigil from memory, “an-and how you put on your Mystery Shack tours, you _do_ have a knack for showmanship.” 

“Hey, youuu just said Mystery Shack without groaning.” 

He huffed up to the tiles on the ceiling, discovering Ley pointing an index finger directly back at him from the other side of the circular triangle tile. His head shook from one side to the other, resolutely walking over to the observation deck’s door. 

“You _honestly_ don’t like the place, do you?” 

Ford felt his feet freeze in front of the vaulted door, automatically staring down at the gray operating wheel. 

“No,” he heard himself sigh. “I do _not_ like the place based on my values for decency and Dimension 46’\ law. After all, it is on _my_ property and in _my_ name." 

He did not regret saying any of this. 

But his words kept echoing off every gray-green tile; its reverb sounding too much like his old self who upheld this dimension’s laws, his old self who would never associate himself with a con-man. But it was _also_ his old self who disassociated himself from everyone who treated him like a freak and focused solely on his work.

The echoes slowly dissolved into pure quiet, persisting as over-rehearsed as that explanation he used to repeatedly imagine giving Stanley in his mind while on the other side of the Trans-Universal Gateway. 

The conditions were standing between them all over again and perhaps even rightfully so. If Stanford had known any better, they seemed like they were taunting him. 

He closed his eyes, feeling even more like a failure. 

He somehow managed to open them and felt his posture straighten a little taller, still looking down at the metallic wheel. 

“B-but I _do_ like seeing you enjoy something that much even though your Mystery Shack started as a front. G-given...” 

He cleared his throat and slowly looked up the door, feeling Stanley standing even closer to him. 

“Given the circumstances, I do _not_ blame you.” he turned, looking the knucklehead directly in the eyes. 

It would not last for too long. 

Stanley looked right back into his, but the lower lining of his shocked brown eyes started to slowly flood. He started looking around the room with a shaky breath all over again. But his faintly bobbing red and yellow shoulders gave away his uneven breathing. Ford almost smirked, wondering if the knucklehead would blame the dust or “allergies” as Ley _is_ wont to do. 

“I … I’m happy that you can say you love your line of work, r-right?” 

“You have _no_ idea, Sixer,” Stan grumbled, finally meeting his eyes. But his eyebrows were practically sinking to the equator of his lenses as he clenched his jaw, Ford studying the stressed wrinkles on the lower half of his paler-looking forehead and the crow’s feet around his eyes. 

Stanley legitimately loved his job, so of _course_ , he was concerned about being thrown out of its base of operations! He should not have been too surprised. Ley’s passion for the things he cares about usually ends up a _little_ possessive sometimes, which is less than what Ford could say about himself. 

“Well,” shook out even more dejected, feeling his shoulders almost slump forward and down to the floor, “you _are_ lucky, Ley. You do not know how lucky you are.” 

Those bushy pale-gray eyebrows sank even further down onto his glasses, a little of that old protective look shining a little sad through his narrow eyelids. 

“Y-you really don’t like all,” the knucklehead flung his arm off to one side as if displaying this room or even the whole bunker or even the work in general, “of _this_ anymore?” 

Stanford felt his chin hit his collar bone, locating the vault wheel out of the corner of one eye. 

“Yes,” he whispered down to his shoes, identifying five more sigil tiles from memory, “more than anything.” 

“But,” Ford sighed a little louder, slowly looking back up even more resolute. “ _I_ almost destroyed this whole dimension just because I needed to know the causality of the weirdness here in Gravity Falls. I can _not_ continue putting myself and others into that danger, although dimension-hopping _has_ primed me for such endeavors. It _is_ the price of being a scientist. But,” he sighed a little more hopeful up to the ceiling, attempting to see something close to a silver lining, “there _is_ always my inventions for lesser-weird enterprises.” 

“Bro,” a warm palm clapped down on the top of his shoulder. 

Stanford could not help but move into it a little bit, feeling stupidly needy. 

Great Sagan, he missed the knucklehead too much! 

“I can tell ya, I’ve tried being one, and if this dimension is anything like the others, it _kinda_ hates guys like us.” 

“Inventors or conmen?” innocently grinned right back, turning back around to the door. 

“Low blow, Poindexter.” 

He smirked, gripping the heavy wheel with both hands and turning it twice around. 

It creaked open, and an air-bound warren of Dimension 46’\ dust bunnies flew onto his lenses. 

Stanford was about to take his glasses off to shake them, but a soft hissing sound was blowing them off for him. He shifted, observing Ley standing even closer beside him and blowing the dust right off. Ford could feel the tears welling in his tear ducts. It felt like all the times Crampelter shoved him down glasses-first into the sand. Ford recalled an even younger version of himself slowly pouring sand over the rest of his head, so Stanley did not have to see him cry. 

‘Oh, c'mon out, Sixer! He’s gone! _I_ showed _him_!’ 

‘I-it’s S-sand T-time r-right now, knucklehead,’ he managed to mutter into a mouthful of tear-soaked wet sand. But this type of isolation customarily ends up becoming a little _less_ effective than all of the times he buried his face into all of his blankets, proclaiming blanket time. 

‘Well, _Sand Time_ might not be very safe, smart guy! C’mon...’ 

Before Ford knew it, Stan dragged him out with one leg. 

‘Find a safer way to bury your face in somethin’...’ 

His cheeks burned with a kind of sand-like razor burn as Stanley bent his knee in front of him, pushing his shoulders up and sitting him on his glutei on Glass Shard Beach. But Stanford could see nothing but a tear-blurry blinding sun beating down just behind amplified and multicolored sand and rock particles like it was a more organic kaleidoscope. 

‘Your shirt, your hands, I mean, anything else!’ the knucklehead wildly shrugged before lifting his frames and dusting off the tops of his wet cheeks. He gently set his glasses back down on his face and alternated, blowing on either lens. 

‘Hey, check it out, Poindexter!’ a younger version Stanley slowly came back into view with a huge, dopey smile on his face, “it's like a car wash!’ 

“Hm,” he heard himself chuckle, “Thank you, knucklehead.” 

Stanford tried sniffing back the tears stabbing his tear ducts; glad that as of last night, their childhood memories did not hurt as much as they used to. 

“Any time, brainiac.” 

He grinned, reaching his arm into the dark surveillance room and turning on the light without even thinking. His palm stretched out to one side as Ford continued standing off to the side, inviting Stan to go into the observation deck first. 

“J-just don’t,” Stanley charged through the door, flailing his bare forearms in the air, “get all hypocritical with me over the law though, smart guy. I dunno what you’ve been doing on the other side of _that_ portal, but I’m willin' ta bet you’ve broken a few laws whether you knew it or not!” 

Stanford stepped into the doorway, feeling his shoulders virtually gravitate towards the concrete. 

“No, you _are_ right.” 

“Stanley,” he sighed, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning against one side of the cold metal door frame, “Wh-what did you honestly think I was up to for the past 30 years, exactly? I ... I swear...” Ford lifted off the doorway and submissively lifted his arms in the air, pulsing his palms forward, “I’m _only_ asking for my _own_ clarity; I promise you I’m _not_ trying to start anything.” 

The knucklehead looked like a deer in headlights. 

“I … I dunno.” 

Stan lifted his hand to the back of his neck, anxiously looking around the room as he nervously scratched. Ford resisted chuckling over the knucklehead still having some of his childhood ticks. But his lips pressed together even harder, and a few wrinkles sprouted from underneath the stubble on his chin. If Stanford had known any better, it almost looked like Stanley’s chin was trembling all over again. 

“I … I always thought you were j-just...” he whistled between his teeth and waved a hand in the dusty air between them, “gone.” 

Stanford exhaled, struggling from loudly sighing. 

Ley was very obviously lying, and he _knew_ Ford knew it! 

“OK, that’s a lie,” he groaned in a sing-song kind of way down to the concrete floor, “I never could work it out real well in my head, but most of the time I used ta think you were strugglin’ or in pain or dyin’ in some way and needed my help real bad. It was a good way ta keep myself motivated in fixin’ that Godzilla-level portal ta get your knuckleheaded genius brain back here.” 

He could feel his face quirk in the tiniest smile, wanting to sense happier-feeling tears on his face. It was strange to desire tears like that. Even wanting to cry in a way that did not involve failure was just a little weird. 

But Stanley was still sheepishly looking down at his shoes, almost like Ma caught them doing something they were not supposed to as he kicked one foot against the bare dark gray cement. 

“An-and sometimes when I was in a scrape, I’d imagine that maybe it wasn’t so bad wherever _you_ were and that you were doin' something really cool, or, heh..." He leaned forward on the balls of his feet and looking back up, adding a footnote onto his explanation, “really what _I_ would consider cool like hookin’ up with a hot Dimension-hoppin' chick or breakin' into a government facility James Bond-style.” 

“Hm, I think that’s what _you_ technically did when you confiscated toxic chemicals from a federal plant, knucklehead,” Stanford pressed his smile together even harder, tightening his arms against his chest. 

“One time!!” Stanley drew out indignantly as he balanced his fists on his hips. 

Ford rolled his pupils up to the ceiling all over again. 

“But it _kinda_ helped to make me feel better but a little jealous at the same time. So, really nothin’ out of the _complete_ ordinary, amirite?” 

“Oh, Stanley,” sighed out even louder than expected, focusing on the entrance to the hidden lab just over Stan’s shoulder. A little terror shot through him from just looking at that awful door, his heart breaking a little more at the knucklehead’s cynicism at the same time. The task at hand needed to be over and done with, _and_ quickly! But there was additionally _so_ much that needed and yet did _not_ need to be said. They did, after all, have the rest of the summer. 

Maybe? 

He had no idea. 

Stanley crisscrossed his arms over his chest just out of the corner of one eye. 

“I was...” Stanford paused to wet his throat, tasting a little of the spam’s salt at the back of his mouth and tightening his grip over his chest, “F-for 30 years, I … I was on the run, Ley, and it was hell.” 

He dared to glance up at him, and Stan’s chin almost looked like it was wobbling all over again. Tears leaped into his eyes, venturing to study this awful room and simultaneously erasing the memories that started kicking at the metal plate. 

“B-Bill Cipher had a hit out on me through so many dimensions I practically have the wanted posters memorized! His ghost followed me everywhere, and I tried _and_ practiced _so_ many foreign and alternative mediums to keep me from falling asleep.” 

Ford ground his teeth together, attempting to find another silver lining. But it seemed like that was all he was doing lately; finding silver linings in impossible things. 

“B-but I did have some great adventures on my own and with others; I also participated in some anthropological and scientific studies I helped assist other scientist-like creatures with.” 

The holographic tattoo of the Great Chief Ptilauliam started running in circles on his forearm like it knew one of the instances Ford silently referenced. He scratched over his sleeve to subdue both the itch _and_ the tattoo itself. 

“So, _I_ was essentially in hiding, and _you_ were on the run.” 

“Yes,” Stanford sighed something like a half-chuckle down to his knees, feeling the ends of his mouth inch up into a tiny smile, “I’m afraid we’re still two sides of the same coin.” 

“Eh,” Stanley tilted his head, uncrossing his arms and balancing one hand on his hip and leaning his other elbow down on the control panel beside him, “I like ta think we’re buncha knuckleheads that need our heads exami—whoa, whoa—” 

His elbow slid out from under him, taking a few sliding buttons along with the ride and hitting his forehead on the camera monitor screen. 

“Ow! Sonuva—” 

Ford sprinted into the room. 

“Oh, Ley! Be careful, be careful!” he stopped in front of the console as his ridiculous conman of a brother staggered a few steps backward, cradling his forehead. 

“If Experiment #210 is still frozen, we do _not_ ,” He looked down at his old friends (that is, if old friends can be control buttons), gesturing his palms across the breadth of the control panel, “want to even so _much_ as touch a thing!” 

Stanley thankfully only turned on the monitor and some of the volume. 

He smiled to himself and took a deep breath, sighing it out down onto the whole panel. Stanford fought off all of those unethical memories all over again, feeling even more solid on his feet as he turned around to face his knucklehead. 

Stanley shook his head, grabbing one of his temples with a tiny wince. The middle of his forehead looked just a little pink from the impact.

“We’re good now,” he sighed, clapping Stan’s shoulders, “We’re fine. A-are you...” 

“DIPPER?!” Stanley shouted, looking over Stanford’s shoulder, terrified. 

“Huh?” 

Ford whipped back around, observing the cryogenic chamber he specifically remembered shoving #210 into cracked beyond repair, almost as if... 

No, it _couldn’t_ have... 

“Ford?” 

He could feel his eyes nearly pop out of his head like some cartoon character, looking around the whole frame trying to find that maniacal Experiment #210. His breath started to come out even more unevenly, and his pulse raced but nowhere near as erratic as it had earlier. 

“Ford?” 

Stanford held his shaky breath, grabbing the joystick, and very slowly and carefully moved the camera lens to the left. 

“FORD?!” 

“Where are you?” he drew out with a sigh, habitually whispering like he used to. 

Ford narrowed his eyes, searching through every last detail behind and in the foreground of the panoramic image. The lab looked even more in shambles than how he and Fidds left it, not even wanting to imagine how #210 managed to destroy his machinery! He moved the joystick to the right with the faintest touch. Luckily, the other cryogenic chamber was working as his patented one-thousand-year lightbulb blared through the subzero mist. 

But there was still nothing. 

“STANFORD FILBRICK PINES!!! **_ WHY  _ ** is Dipper in there?!” 

He huffed and turned around all over again, not even caring about the state of his digestion. 

“STANLEY!” he shouted right back in his face, a little frightened to raise his voice so close to a thawed out #210. “I have NO idea what you’re talking about!!!” 

Stanley blinked even wider, dropping his jaw in total disbelief. 

He narrowed his eyebrows down black glasses frames, and a shadow darkened his face. 

“Yeah, you do,” grumbled a little more levelly. 

“L-Ley,” Ford heard his voice crack apologetically, “I … I don’t know …” 

“YES, YOU DO, SIXER! WHY, **_ WHY  _ ** IN THE NAME OF P.T. BARNUM IS DIPPER...” 

Two firm hands grabbed Ford by the shoulders and spun him around. Stanley pointed a thick index finger over his right shoulder into the monitor and directly at the functioning cryogenic chamber. 

“...IN THERE?!” 

Stanford winced his eyes into the blaring bright light, finally seeing it. 

He blinked out wide, lurching backward and accidentally bumping into Stanley’s chest. 

Dipper's investigating skills must have become so refined, it led him down here because a perfect copy of his 12-year-old grand-nephew was locked in the freezing antechamber. It appeared like he had frozen mid-scream with his arms up in fright, his eyes large with fear. But there was something in his young face that seemed almost mocking and evil beyond his years. 

He shook his head. 

It seemed like Stanford could barely trust his eyes today, after the morning _he_ had. 

But he knew better, knowing the last time he saw that brilliant young man was precisely at 8:30 that morning as Dipper stumbled down the steps into the kitchen. He remembered holding a cup of coffee in one hand and the Recogn-ray in the other and _not_ exactly loving the smell of burning cheap plastic countertop in the morning. 

‘Mornin’, Grunkle Ford!’ he nervously pitched, grabbing a glass and carton of orange juice as he ran over to the kitchen table. 

‘C-could you tell Mabel and Grunkle Stan,’ But Ford kept staring down into the smoke, ensuring the state of the countertop. But Dipper’s chattering was becoming harder to ignore as he kept talking louder and squeakier as he poured his orange juice, every noise in the room sounding even more acute by the second, ‘I … I went to the Corduroy’s t-to watch horror movies wi-with Wendy?! What _are_ you doing?’ 

Stanford finally sighed out loud in relief as he lifted the grip, blowing on the flaming hot tips of the barrel. His other pinky finger lifted off his coffee mug and switched off the identification screen. 

‘Percepto-bugs, Dipper!’ he softly boomed, taking another sip of his coffee and feeling even lighter after last night and this latest colony. ‘I’m sure you have seen them around without ever knowing they were there. They usually group up in colonies to create a physical and tangible memory tailored to _your_ perception, _and_ as you can see, Dipper...’ 

He gestured the gun down, outlining the gently smoking square-sized hole where that bag of jelly beans and Stanley’s note laid just hours before. The colony must have fallen asleep glued to one another as they are sometimes known to do and almost like how _he_ had fallen asleep attached to Stan’s arm. Stanford was strangely not even that disappointed at what he thought was an act of kindness. Everything that followed felt even better than a misshapen jelly bean, but then, he had _only_ been back for about a week! 

Give him time. 

‘They can be eradicated solely by smoke, so if you see anything that resembles something you own but somewhere where you would _not_ expect it to be and, no...’ 

Ford could not help but chuckle as he set his coffee down, lifting the Recogn-ray even higher up in the air and far away from the 12-year-old's reach. 

‘No, you may _not_ use the Recogn-ray and certainly not _even_ with supervision! Normally, I would not recommend children to play with matches. But, if you light two and brush the smoke...' he fanned his free hand over the cooled-off barrel as if demonstrating the act, ‘in the direction of the colony, they will transpire pretty easily. It’s like burning sage but guiding the smoke than the smudge stick itself!’ 

‘A-actually, Grunkle Ford...' Sherman’s grandson shrugged an arm up into the air, and Dipper looked so much like his grandfather as he knitted his eyebrows together. Stanford shakily inhaled, remembering learning on the catenet that Sherman had died of a heart attack a few years ago, ‘using certain types of sages is _actually_ pretty insensitive to the indigenous."

‘We learned that in school last year over Thanksgiving. Mabel even pretended she was a more accurate version of the Disney Pocahontas movie. She gave everyone at school nature stickers whenever they picked up litter or hugged a tree on the playground. But they were only playing hide-and-seek behind them, and Mabel ended up picking up all the litter herself, so she put all of the stickers all over _her_ face instead.’ 

Dipper may have cringed a little, but there was a legitimate eye-rolling affection for his older sister. 

Stanford could only imagine what Stanley was thinking about him in his slumber. 

These children are _truly_ extraordinary. 

Sherman and his son _must_ have copulated with some exceptional women to create this youngest generation of Pines twins. He held the women in both of their lives to an even higher esteem, wishing he could have met both of them. Stanley very obviously ruined him ever meeting Sherman’s son and his wife. 

Ford looked back down at the countertop (or, really, its remains) as the crater slowly simmered. He could not help but wonder if his instincts leaped too quickly in destroying something that looked very clearly misplaced but entirely plausible at the same time. 

It _was_ plausible. 

Yes, it _was_ plausible! 

He had to naturally start trusting Stanley without any Percepto-bugs or his dumb head getting in the way. It had to be all on him (at least, to a fault according to the oldest sibling rule) and the knowledge he had that would keep these kids safe. It looked to be the new way into Stan’s heart. That is if he would let him in. Last night, thankfully, shattered through all of the initial ice-cold walls and warm blankets and “I missed you”’s. 

‘W-well, Grunkle Ford, I told Wendy I’d be at her place by 9.’ 

Dipper slurped all of his orange juice down in one quick gulp, still standing beside him. 

‘Sh-shouldn’t you have some breakfast? A-and horror movies so early in the morning?’ 

‘Eh,’ he slowly inched towards the doorway, shrugging. 

Dipper dropped his hands back to his sides as he balanced on one foot, scratching the shoelaces on one foot against his other bare calf. 

‘Th-they’re _only_ the crappy B-movie kind with the guy dressed up in a more upright monster costume. _And_ Wendy’s making pancakes with marshmallows and fruit loops on top! Doesn’t that sound awesome?!’ 

It sounded disgusting, coming from the guy who could barely masticate this dimension’s food! But Dipper looked so earnest and excited ruining his day _did_ seem a little ill-advised. 

‘That sounds like what childhood is made of!’ he heard himself diplomatically quip, sliding one hand into his trench coat pocket and slightly tilting the Recogn-ray in a salute in the other. ‘I send you off with my blessing, Dipper! Just promise me you will call someone here at the house when you get to the Corduroys, alright?’ 

‘You got a … a … d-d-g-good idea there, Grunkle Ford!’ 

Dipper ran out of the kitchen, his sneakers squeaking around the corner towards the back door. 

‘I’ll see you for dinner!’ he shouted over his shoulder. 

Stanford felt his head shake, remembering all of the times Stanley and himself shouted the very same thing to Ma on summer mornings. Those five words could not have made him feel any older and perhaps even a little like a father! His head kept shaking until he looked down at his dominant hand, clocking the door slamming shut at 8:45 AM. 

He spun around, realizing they were practically standing nose-to-nose. 

Stanley took a quick open-handed swipe at the air in front of him. His eyes looked so large and terrified as big fat tears rolled out of them, Ford felt lightning bolts in his own nervous system. 

He flinched, leaping back to the ledge of the console. 

Stan stuck a meaty index finger directly in his face. 

“DON’TCHA KNOW SHERMIE’S KID IS GOIN’ TA KILL YOU?! HELL, SIXER, I COULD REALLY MESS YA UP RIGHT NOW!” 

He grabbed his wrist with his other hand, perhaps not even realizing he was pushing up a long shirt sleeve that was not even there. 

Stanford stepped between the monitor and his twin, barely prepared to be on the receiving end of a well-deserved Pines twin punch. He felt his heart started pulsing faster and breathing growing even shallower just from feeling Stanley’s angst. But there was no need to fight, _and_ he could prove it! 

“Stanley, th-that’s,” Ford pointed back to the screen, “that’s _not_ Dipper!” 

“You’re lyin’, Sixer. WHY...” 

“I SWEAR I’m NOT lying, Ley!” 

He felt a hot tear stream out of one eye as he dropped his hands to his sides, grabbing Stanley’s cellular flip phone from his back pocket. But Stan started lifting a fully formed fist. Stanford struggled to understand its modern technology even faster, switching from one screen to another until finding Dipper’s contact information. Ford shot out his free hand to dodge the fist coming directly at his face, pushing the green phone button with the other and practically shoving the phone against the side of Stanley’s face. 

Stan just batted it away from his ear. 

“Get _my_ phone outta my face, Sixer. I’m gonna kill ya!” 

Stanley started advancing on him, lifting both of his hands like he was about to grab his shoulders or worse. But Ford still would _not_ fight him. Not again, even if one of them thought he was right! 

“Now, now, Stanley, listen...” 

He put the cellular phone receiver back up to his ear. 

“I DON’T WANNA LISTEN!” 

Stan shoved it away all over again. 

“STANLEY!” 

Stanford lifted the phone to the knucklehead’s ear, slapping a defensive hand away with the other. He gripped Stanley’s ear and held on for dear life as his fingers cupped around the helix. But Stanley shoved him hard up against the console. Ford looked over one shoulder, still holding the phone against Stan’s face and finding his lower back avoided all of the buttons devoted to the antechambers. 

“Gr-Grunkle Stan?!” Dipper shouted through the receiver as he squeaked in his prepubescent hitch. He almost sounded out of breath, like he was running. 

Stanley paused and blinked wildly into Stanford’s trench coat buttons, attempting to catch his breath. 

Ford resisted touching his shoulder. 

“DIPPER?!” 

He blinked back up at him, squinting over Stanford’s shoulder. Before Ford knew it, Stanley had a grip on his cellular phone with one hand, and he was being shoved directly into the wall next to the door with the other. 

He grunted, feeling his bicep and temple ring as a tear rolled from the corner of one eye. 

Stanley was practically shoving his nose through the monitor. 

“Dipper, _where_ are you?!” he kept searching the screen like _that_ Dipper’s fake scared-looking face could magically speak to him. 

“I … I’m _here_ , Grunkle Ford,” shouted through the receiver. 

Stanford just stood by the wall, crossing his shaking arms around his waist. He could even feel his chin trembling as well, practically smelling the PTSD of falling into the portal between them just from one stupid little shove. His arms pressed even tighter around him. Even his mouth was shaking and gasping as he raised one wrist to wipe the tears off his face. But Ford would _not_ be wrong in thinking he was not the only one feeling it, although that being the last thing on Stan’s mind at the moment. 

“A-actually, I’m here with Wendy.” 

Dipper sounded like he was finally standing still, although a little breathless and squeaky as the wind died down in the background. But Stanford knew _that_ younger twin tone a little too well, wishing he had the energy to roll his eyes as his arms started to soften around his chest. 

“W-we were watching m-movies at her house wh-when Mabel called an--” 

“An-and invited us over to her Mabel-Palooza, Mr. Pines!” Stanley’s teenage employee jumped in, another whoosh of heavy wind thumping between her words. “It’s _all_ good! Soos and I will watch the little zombies for ya, dude.” 

“Uh,” he drew out in a grunt, breathing a little more evenly. 

Stanley stared into the monitor screen, confused. Stanford’s arms slowly stopped shaking, wanting so desperately to hug the old blockhead. But that shove made everything come back a little more vivid, and while Ford did not _necessarily_ hate him, hugging him would _still_ be too soon. 

“Ah, O...? K...?” Stanley slowly dragged out, looking right back at him. 

He shot his arms down to their sides, pretending like whatever just happened to him did not just, in fact, happen. It felt almost unadvisable to add any more pressure to the situation. 

Stan blinked his eyes wide open. 

Damn it. 

Stanford sighed down to the tips of his boots. 

“I … I’ll be back in a bit, kids. Don’t be gettin' yourselves into any mor-ju-” 

Stanley kept staring at him, blinking even larger. 

“Ju-just don’t get into any trouble, K?” 

A few very antiallergenic tears slowly leaked out of his eyes. 

“On it, Mr. Pines! Dipper?” 

The phone clicked and crunched multiple times like it was changing hands. 

Stan stood there gritting his teeth and slamming his eyes shut, holding the cellular phone a few inches away from his ear with all of the noise coming out of it. 

But he opened his eyes, looking over at Ford so wounded it hit a chord deep in his own nerves. Stanford could feel the tears hitting the corners of his eyes, and he had to look away. His eyes naturally drifted over to the screen, and his molars ground together. 

A dark, angry cloud gradually came over his face. 

He slowly looked back at an even more distraught Stanley, feeling the cloud lift off of him a little bit. 

The phone went dead like either Dipper and Miss Corduroy wordlessly canceled the call. 

He almost expected the feedback to buzz as _he_ knew telecommunication. 

They kept looking at each other for what felt like minutes, Stanley’s gradually smoother breathing the only noise between them. 

Watery brown eyes blinked back more and more tears, but they still could not look him directly in the eye. Each tear felt like a repeated stabbing sensation to his own chest. 

“F-For—” 

Stanley’s dark brown loafers tapped in his direction. 

Stanford dug his fingernails into his palms instead of crisscrossing his arms. 

But it was selfish to allow his traumas to become an elephant in the observation deck! Stanley just had the scare of his life, discovering who he believed to be one of his young charges in cryogenic stasis. Ford crushed his molars together even harder, carefully watching Ley walk up to him. It almost felt like what led up Filbrick to kick Stan out, how they had their respective lives and barely heeding a more silent monozygotic call to assist one another in a time when it seemed impossible. Ford kept digging his fingernails into his hands, making sure he would _not_ be the first to break. It was about _Stanley_ right now! 

Just Stanley. 

Loafers squeaked even further across the concrete. 

Stanford started to shake despite his resolve, looking up into the dark gray ceiling tile and hearing a deep, shaky breath hissing out in front of him. 

Something hard hit the floor, and two warm somethings went around his waist. 

“Si-sixer...” 

He looked down, finding Stanley's faint balding spot nearly burrowing into his stomach. A deep, genial scoff sighed down onto the top of the knucklehead’s head, feeling the ends of a smile quirk even higher. The inside of his chest felt surprisingly gooey after going through a traumatic episode. He dropped his hand on a trembling shoulder blade and felt his heart break all over again. 

“I … I’m s–” 

“I-i-if I had...” 

“Stanley,” softly breathed down into his hair, not even caring about subtlety. A hand cupped the back of his head, mindlessly brushing a few fingers through a few strands. Tears slowly started to tickle at the corners of his eyes, feeling even more like an older brother. “Stanley, it’s OK.” 

“No, it’s _not_! Well, I mean, c-considering...” 

“Stanley,” Ford heard himself softly chuckle as he slowly sat down on his calves, looking the knucklehead directly in the eyes. 

Stan silently shook his head and averted his wet red cheeks over towards the door. 

“I’m a horrible summer guardian, Poindexter.” 

“No, you’re _not_ , Ley,” came out of him so soft and insistent, it barely sounded like himself. 

“YES, I AM!” Stanley loudly sobbed, looking back into his face. 

“Look at _me_ , Sixer!” 

He shrugged his bare forearms, lifting his hands in the air. 

“I have tried so, SO hard to hide our weird lives from Shermie’s kid and his wife for the last _12_ years of my life! I was there when those kids were born. I was _there_ when Shermie died, and _I_ was the one dealing with Carole for a whole week!” 

Stanford felt like a knife went even deeper into his chest, remembering his baby brother dead. 

“I was there when Shermie’s knuckleheaded son asked me to take the kids for the summer, and I did EVERYTHING imaginable to keep them from finding out about the _real_ us. I shoved a dresser in front of your bedroom door. I pretended that the weird in town didn’t even exist. I had to make **_ those  _ **,” Stanley shot an index finger over in the direction of the door, even bigger tears rolling down his face, “great little niblings afraid of me, but it seemed to only work on Dipper! So, imagine m-my... wh-when I … I s-saw...” 

He weakly gestured over his shoulder toward the monitor, breathing softer and softer. 

“I … I’m a horrible...” 

A crippling sound sobbed down to his thighs. 

Stanford felt his hands lift for the knucklehead’s cheeks, the touch nearly lighting all that gooey-ness in his body on fire. He felt his face light up in the biggest smile and silently hoped that it emanated out of his dermis. Stanley’s soft stubble brushed against his palms, taking him even further out of his head. Ford felt even more vindicated in feeling like a brother all over again. No, he _was_ his brother now, whether the idiot liked it or not! 

“Stanley, you’re _not_ a horrible summer guardian!” he insisted, feeling the smile lift his mouth. 

Stan kept staring down at the floor. 

Ford lifted his chin back up, forcing the guy to look at him. 

He pointed his wincing eyes everywhere else but back into Stanford’s face, softly grinding his teeth together. Stan took a deep, shaky breath and blinked a few more times, slowly staring out the door in obvious discomfort. 

“Think about what _you_ just said. Would a bad summer guardian go to all of those lengths to make _those_ kids feel secure? That means you try, knucklehead! And while Dipper may still be a little jittery around you—” 

“He’s going to be 13 in another few months. What 13-year-old boy wouldn’t be jittery?!” 

“Hm, fair enough,” Stanford chuckled, feeling his insides so warm and gooey, he felt like the very textbook definition of compassion. It felt so foreign and wonderful all at the same time. But it was also strange not second-guessing the two differences. “But I _do_ see from a distance that Mabel adores you. You have no idea how lucky y—” 

Stanley whipped back around, grabbing him around the waist all over again. 

Ford could not help but flinch backward but realized what was happening. 

Stan hinged his chin over the slope of his shoulder. 

He grinned to himself, cupping Ley’s shoulders in the closest thing to a hug. Something kept holding himself back from really hugging the guy. But Stanley laid the side of his face on his shoulder, a wet sniff drenching his shoulder. Stanford felt like he could have melted just from that amount of trust the knucklehead had in him, and perhaps _that_ was it! It is harder to return to consciously trusting others. Thinking it is _one_ thing, but actively doing it is a different species altogether! 

The corner of one eye found the console area, glancing at the switched-on monitor. 

Stanford felt the grin on his face go dark and sensed the shoulder of his coat sleeve soaked at the same time. 

He did not even care; it was worth it. 

“H-hey, Ley,” he softly shook his shoulders. 

The knucklehead looked back up at him. 

Ford lifted one of the cuffs of his trench coat to Stanley’s red face, alternating wiping the apples of his cheeks with a tiny smile. Stan pinched the ends of his mouth in a sadder-looking grin, still looking a little uncomfortable from all of this kind of attention. But he grinned a little brighter as he hoisted the knucklehead’s glasses up to dry the rest of his face, wondering if Stan was silently drawing parallels to Sand Time as much as _he_ was. 

Stanley sniffed in something like a reply. 

“ _I’d_ feel better if we continued this conversation outside.” 

“Yeah, the feelin’s mutual.” 

They both chuckled into each other’s faces. 

Stanford sighed a little brighter, clapping his hands down on the knucklehead’s shoulders. 

“C-could you go ahead? I’ll be right behind you.” 

The corner of one eye went dark, looking over at the monitor. 

“I need to do something first.” 

He quickly looked back at Stanley, feeling the light return to his face. 

“But I need _every_ piece of information you have ever experienced with or because _of_ Bill Cipher. I need you to tell me everything!” 

*

“...I kinda felt like something was off in my head the whole time. It kinda even felt like I wanted to wake up, but I couldn’t. But anyway... When I came to, Soos and the kids were standin’ over me and lookin’ like The Creature of the Black Lagoon was finally harpooned or somethin’...” 

Stanford snorted, still feeling a little shaky. 

He wrapped his arms around his waist. 

Stanley carefully gazed back at him as they kept sitting on the same step in front of the same bunker door. 

He almost wanted to unwrap his arms all over again just because Stan was finding him in a vulnerable moment. But his tremor was not necessarily out of post-trauma, but instead, finally taking advantage of the emergency self-destruct button on the working cryogenic chamber. Ford almost felt disappointed that for all of his “training” in all of his “dimension-hopping,” he was not _quite_ prepared for killing a half-Dimension 46’\ creature. But the way his voice angrily growled still haunted him. 

“This is what you get for messing with my family,” he whispered, rumbling directly into the monitor before pushing the red button. It felt good. 

Too good. 

He would have allowed Stanley to stay if #210 had shapeshifted into anything other than Dipper. A little regret almost hated himself for not half-thawing it out so the infernal creature could suffer. 

Stanford legitimately scared himself sometimes. 

“But that li’l pipsqueak of a con artist blew up the safe, got my...your...our...” 

The poor guy slowly turned on the step, a little uncertainty glancing back at him. 

Ford could not blame him. 

“Our?” he carefully grinned, resisting finishing that sentence with a “for now." He felt loathed considering those two awful words, hating what he had become. 

Ley lit up a little brighter, looking down to his interlaced fingers between his knees. 

“ _The_ deed, essentially. Anyway...” 

Stanford sighed, feeling a remarkable sense of peace and mackle. He looked up at the broken lever, not even caring what caused it to break. Organic trees intertwined with the canopy of metallic branches above, looking almost like a picture frame holding a large expanse of blue sky in the middle. 

“ _That_ little piece of work blew up the safe, got the deed, broke my sign, and kicked us out! We w-were...” he started to mumble down to his knees, lifting a hand to the back of his neck. 

“Uh, forced out of the shack, but we ended up staying at Mrs. Alzamirano’s, uh, Soos’s grandmother’s place for a few days. But she couldn’t take care of us for too long. I tried to tell Shermie’s kid everythin' was fine, but I _knew_ I had to make the kids go home. I even drove them to the bus station, but before I realize it, I’m drivin’ up to a crime scene just under the bridge, and that little twerp was gettin' frisked by the cops.” 

“I...” he slowly drew out, tilting his head to one side. A little half-cocked smile slightly resisted a tinier version of Stanley Caryn Pines’s classic shit-eating grin. 

“Uh, I _may_ have exposed the kid handing out video camera buttons for his “psychic...”” Stan groaned, flexing air quotes in the air, “abilities between gettin' out of the car and Gleeful gettin' frisked.” 

“ _May_ have?” 

Stanford grinned, wordlessly bouncing his shoulder onto Stanley’s. 

“Ah, quit while you’re ahead, Poindexter,” Stan chuckled, waving a dismissive hand in the shaded air between them. He lifted that same palm in the air with a little shrug, “Anyway, guess what came falling out of his baby monkey suit?” 

“The deed.” 

Stanley turned back around on the stair, looking deadly serious. 

“ _And_ the second journal.” 

Ford felt the wind knocked out of him, slowly gasping down at his knees. 

He had it coming. 

But who knew a young child could be so bloodthirsty? Burying the second journal so close to the Elementary School became one of the dumbest things he had ever done in his life. It was third to almost starting an apocalypse and letting a yellow triangle with a top hat take over his body for hours on end! 

He felt his hands cover his face. 

And yet, _how_ was he to know a child could be so bloodthirsty? 

“’Ey, Poindexter,” a softer bump nudged his shoulder. 

“A-are you OK? I saw your face back there an—” 

“Oh!” 

Ford felt his palms slowly slide off his face, reaching one hand back to grab at a handful of hair on the back of his head. He kept looking ahead into the fake bark-like matrix of the bunker with a little forced grin. It was still about Stanley right now, and being selfless felt remarkably a little easier than it had been a few days ago. 

“Ju-just some good old-fashioned post-trauma, Ley.” 

It was at least _that_ somewhat true. 

“I’m _so_ sorry about that, Stanford. It was kinda a knee-jerk reaction.” 

A bird tweeted in a tree close by, and perhaps the same woodpecker drummed into another, rhythmically establishing its territory. 

The corner of one eye discovered Stan staring right back at him, dumbfounded and yet concerned. Stanford huffed into the back of his throat. At least he apologized. But it was still _Stanley’s_ time, and yet, a person cannot always pause their thoughts and traumas for the benefit of reciprocal communication when it becomes suddenly convenient! Stanley blinked, and even more concern lit up in his face. That look almost went on the “Why Stanley is a Good Summer Guardian” list. The knucklehead could somehow manage to be selfless even in the aftermath of an emotional breakdown. 

But a bushy gray eyebrow started to lift. 

“And, yeah, there’s _that_ , and then there’s me having to pry your shaky tokhes out of the porthole,” Stanford quickly glanced over at him, and both eyebrows were sinking across his lenses, “Y-you looked like you saw a ghost, Sixer, what ha—” 

“I killed Experiment #210, Stanley, OK?” 

Ford realized he had accidentally lifted his voice and stared directly into Stan’s eyes as they nearly bugged out of his head. He sighed, fanning his palms up and out in front of him. 

“I killed Experiment #210, and I would have let you watch if it had not frozen up looking like Dipper.” 

He whistled between his teeth and looked down between his knees to the next step. 

“That’s some pretty dark shit right there, Poindexter.” 

“I … I know,” sighed right out of him, blinking down to the same step. Elbows balanced on their respective knee caps, not even knowing what he was feeling at this exact moment. 

“I cannot decide if I am proud of it or not, but despite its shape, it felt good.” 

“So,” Stanley grunted down his left side, “what’re we gonna do about the kids?” 

Stanford felt his lips fold together, not even knowing what to say. 

His eyes slid down even further towards the closed main door, glad to have glued the porthole shut. The tub of his patented Orangutan Glue still sat beside him and ready to glue the main entry at any moment. Stanley may have had his protestations with not selling any of the contents of his weaponry cabinet. But even he agreed that it was better to let the whole place go down in proverbial flames. 

“C’mon, Si-ah-Poindexter! You’re always the one with a plan!” 

He sighed hard through his nostrils, pinching the bridge of his nose. 

“Stanford?” sounded even more worried than before. 

“Stanley,” he sighed behind the hand draped over his face, hating to disappoint the guy. “I … I _wish_ I had an easy answer, but unfortunately, I do not. Those kids have already been affected for months, and there is _no_ way to hide it from them now. I am sorry to say carrying on maybe our only option. We have to take all of this one day at a time and try to use the best judgment imaginable given the weird circumstances!” 

His thumb brushed down his chin, forming a fist as it dropped on his opposite thigh with a soft thump. 

“I _will_ say that the rift you provoked was a small one, but it has been contained and procured in a safe location. But there is _always_ a risk that it could escape. So, it must be closely monitored. I … I know...” he thumped his fist back down onto one pants leg, “it sounds selfish, Ley, but I think this is an assignment that I _must_ undertake by myself.” 

“Hey, go right ahead,” chuckled down his left arm. 

“I wasn’t very good at your science-y stuff anyway. But I _do_ have loads of old surveillance equipment in the office if you need any.” 

Stanford felt his eyes blink a few times, not even considering the option. He slowly looked over to Stanley as his defeated-looking brown eyes sheepishly grinned. 

“Th-that’s _not_ a bad idea,” he grinned directly back into his eyes, affectionately bumping his shoulder into Stanley’s all over again. Stan smiled back in his, and there was even more of that mackle making him all warm and gooey. 

“Y-you know, you’re a great summer guardian, knucklehead.” 

Ley blinked down to the few inches of the wood step between them, wiping his thumb and index finger underneath his plastic frames up towards his nose. That hugging sensation started to become even more impossible to avoid. Even an “I love you, Ley” wanted to come right out of his throat, and he, Stanford Pines, would mean every word. But, now was not a good time. 

“Yeah well,” he grunted with a tiny sniff, “I … I don’t really feel like one right now.” 

“Perhaps, but I have good intel in your favor,” Stanford felt his eyes and face light up even brighter, watching Stanley slowly blinked a little confused back up at him. “You did a pretty good job taking care of _me_ for 16 years, all things considered.” 

“Well, heh, to be honest, Sixer, you’re kinda hopeless without me.” 

Stanley grinned back at him so playfully it was hard not to smile right back, even as the blockhead’s cheeks went a little pink and lifted his hand reached for the back of his neck. 

They just looked at each other for what felt like minutes. 

Ford happily basked in the half-shaded quiet. 

A few birds called to one another in a few trees behind him, a few twigs cracking and bending under what he hoped to be the paw of a squirrel. Stan was finally breathing neutrally once more, and all felt almost right in this dimension. At least, except for this consistent sense of guilt and his stupid, untrusting mind. There was _no_ way to know what it would take to defeat all of that! 

“I know,” he breathed, helplessly grinning. 

But his tear ducts started softly rumbling, feeling tears rolling down his face. Stanford tried to swallow them away, but a thick lump rose in his throat instead. The knucklehead was _not_ wrong. But at the same time, he could not entirely regret anything in his life, save for Bill Cipher, at least professionally! Something felt even more beyond mackle, deflating heavy balloons that weighed against his shoulders. Perhaps this was what it felt like to forgive yourself! 

A small sob hiccupped right out. 

Stanford felt his body catapult forward, throwing his arms around the knucklehead’s neck. 

Stanley hugged him right back and hard. 

He could feel his head shake, amazed he was hugging the guy he had punched over a week ago. It _really_ had been 40 years since the last time they had done this. But then, it might have been even longer. He could not even remember when it could have happened! Ford buried his face into Stan’s shoulder, letting his tears stain the knucklehead’s garish red and yellow shirt. 

He gasped into Stanley’s shirt, and the tears just got hotter and faster. 

His twin tightened his grip around him. 

“Stanley, Stanley...” he heard himself whisper. 

“Ford,” Stan whispered right back, “you dumb, dumb knucklehead.” 

“W-well, _that’s_ quite an understatement!” 

Stanford sniffed into Stanley’s shoulder, knowing the guy did not care about hygiene as much as he did. 

He lifted his head off that ridiculous Hawaiian shirt and leaned his forehead against Stan’s. 

Stanley happily sighed right into his face, and Ford nestled his forehead back and forth against the knucklehead’s forehead. Nothing could have felt more appropriate. 

*

“So...” 

They kept walking through the forest, Stanford hearing nothing but two pairs of feet crunching against tall grass and some foliage. It was strange the forest was so quiet today. He grinned up into an even brighter blue-looking sky, clocking the sun at 14:00 hours. It felt like the kind of summer day when he used to crave a good snow cone, preferably the blue flavor. Stanley used to have _such_ ambitions to run the snow cone truck someday, even at six-years-old! 

Ford heard himself chuckle, glancing over at the knucklehead. 

Stan kept waving his hands in front of his face, shooing a few more flies away. But these little bastards were pretty persistent, and his hands were honestly getting a _little_ tired. He swiped a few more away with one hand. At least moving around like this had its advantages of moving the air a little bit! He was sweating like a whore in church and a _little_ too glad he put on a T-shirt this morning. 

“Who’s Marilyn?” 

He smacked himself directly on the schnoz. 

“OW!” 

His head shook back and forth, a little stunned. It didn’t exactly help that vile woman’s name was in the air between them. 

"Whu—ho— wh-where'd you hear that name?!” 

Stanford softly chuckled to himself, pausing a few steps ahead as he turned to face him. He crossed his arms over his chest and folded his lips together, a little too eager to hear this anecdote. 

“Hm, well, you talk in your sleep, boy wonder!” 

“Oh, right. Well, uh...” 

Stanley glanced around the forest, feeling his hand lift to the back of his neck. He nervously scratched and looked around the pretty boring forest with nothing interesting to look at. Of course, the nerd would put his Frankenstein laboratory where no one would find it, but still, a waterfall? Some picnic tables? An outdoor amphitheater?! Figures. 

But at least this case of nerves wasn’t as loaded as they were down in Sixer’s bat cave. Stan shook his head a little quicker, never wanting to think about _that_ place ever again! 

“Heh, well,” his hand went flying off his neck in something like a shrug. 

“M-my ex-wife. There. I said it. I was married. But it didn’t last for too long though,” Stan walked up beside the old genius, clapping the back of his neck. It felt so normal and weird all at once, and Ford seemed to light up like a Christmas tree every time something like that happened to him. It felt pretty good to make the guy look like a kid again, feeling so much like the old times. 

“She, ah, divorced me after two days. I caught her stealing my car.” 

The old genius tossed his head back, actually laughing than doing one of his “smart guy” chuckles. 

“Only you, knucklehead,” Stanford shook his head, wiping a tear off his face. “Only you.” 

He playfully glared right back, jokingly tapping Ford’s jaw with a barely formed fist. 

Ford felt the jest in the fake punch, taking it much better than he thought he would have. 

“Just the one, though?” 

“W-well, I, uh…” Stan balled up his fists and balanced them on his hips, almost sheepishly staring down at his loafers. 

“I _kinda_ had my hands full for the last few decades, so really,” he flexed his shoulders up into a shrug, staring down at the patch of grass between their shoes, “you did me a favor. Crazy women usually flock to me anyway.” 

“Still,” a warm hand landed on the top of his shoulder cap. 

“You deserve to have someone, knucklehead.” 

Stanley swallowed a whole biblical flood of tears down his throat. 

“Sure,” he looked back up, rolling his eyes back to the old nerd, “sign me up for someone with a few more marbles than usual.” 

Ford did one of those little “smart guy” chuckles. 

The both of them started walking all over again. 

“How ‘bout you, Poindexter? Did _you_ ever get married?” 

“W-well, wait, hold on,” he interrupted himself, freezing next to one of those nicer-smelling pine trees and resisted the sensation to lean up against it. Ol’ Stan-O learned _that_ the hard way about a million years ago. He looked back over to the senior citizen version of his twin, and even he stopped at the same time as him. Were they officially back? Pines Twins powers activated?! Stanley couldn’t tell. 

“Do things in other dimensions even do _that_ stuff?” 

“Of course, creatures from other dimensions mate or sign mutual live-in arrangements, knucklehead!” 

“Well, you don't make it sound very romantic, though.” 

“Why, Stanley!” Stanford heard himself tease, lifting an even lighter-feeling arm, and tried to pinch his cheek. The knucklehead repeatedly but jokingly slapped it away from him as Ford’s persistence grew, “I had no idea you grew into a romantic. I remember the Valentine’s Day of 1971 incident with Anita Biedermann.” 

“I’m gonna get you for that, Nerdzilla.” 

“Do your worst,” Ford smiled between a few tears. 

“B-but really,” Stanley started walking all over again, casually looking down at his loafers, “Did you... I … I mean, have _you_ ever been married?” 

Stanford froze, feeling a little hesitant and finding himself standing on a sea of clover. A cottontail went sprinting across the little patch just ahead of him, five kittens running after their mother. Nothing felt more like a more wonderful reprieve from the weirder residents of this forest! 

“No,” he heard himself sigh. 

“Never married, but I _did_ date off and on over the years. But,” Ford heard himself exhale, grinning back up at the old knucklehead. “They were four weeks-long relationships. There was never an option to settle into something with, well, being on the run and all. Too risky.” 

“Heh, I always knew you had the potential to be a real lady-killer, Poindexter.” 

He chuckled down to his boots. 

“Why specifically a _lady_ -killer, Ley?” 

Stanford slowly looked back up with a tiny grin. 

Stanley looked at his twin like he just grew two heads or something. 

“W-wait,” he felt his blood pressure strike, lifting his hands in the air like he was getting arrested for the millionth time in his life, “n-not that I’m n-not homoph—or-or anything...” 

“No, no, _I_ understand, Stanley!” Ford carefully walked through the clover, looking down to dodge any rabbit feces. “An initial admission of ignorance always comes with a little shock, but what I meant was...” 

He finally stood on solid grass, grinning back into Ley’s best Peter Lorre impression. 

“Not all of the dimensions beyond our understanding share our gender constructs, so I have nothing for you to go on but their names and species. They were wonderful partners for those points in my life.” Stanford felt a warm smile stretch over his face, a different kind of gooey-ness attacking his insides. “I miss them all dearly.” 

Stan wordlessly flung an arm around his shoulder and left it there. 

They both started walking at the same time around a few more pine trees, nearing the edge of the shack's property.

“So, um, Sherman?” Stanford carefully drew the corner of one eye over to the guy beside him, feeling the inside of Stanley’s elbow suddenly soaking into the collar of his trench coat. 

He softly huffed, blinking over to the knucklehead as he glanced over at him a little nervously. 

The nerd did _not_ prepare him for this! But then, neither did Shermie’s heart. 

Stan took a big, fat breath as he shifted his feet in Sixer’s direction. He crossed his arms over his chest, trying hard to keep his brain from going back to that hospital room and Mabel’s clueless little 7-year-old face asking him where “Grampa Shermie” really went. Dipper was too busy being hugged by his Grandma to realize what was happening. 

“I-it’s OK, Stanley. Well, it’s truly _not_ , b-but I did some of what the kids call “Googling...”” Ford lifted his hands, assimilating air quotes in the softer heat underneath the shadows of the Douglas firs, “And I found Sherman’s o-o-obituary...” 

“Yeah,” he grunted, curling his hand around the back of the old nerd’s neck. Maybe Stan imagined it, or the old Nerdzilla kinda nuzzled backward into his palm. “It was a real humdinger of a heart attack too! Heh, wanna know what his last words were?” 

“I’m almost afraid to ask,” Stanford felt an inappropriate smile flexing the tears on his cheeks, his eyes slowly narrowing together. 

“Carole, pass the bacon. I’m goin' out in style.” 

He loudly scoffed, slapping his face into his hand. Stanley, however, was dying laughing right beside him as he tightened the inside of his elbow around Ford’s neck. 

It was official. All three of the Pines boys ended up becoming _real_ knuckleheads. 

“An-and,” he looked back up with a sniff, feeling a few more tears shake out of his eyes, “What is his wife like?” 

“Hoo boy,” Stan shook his head, whistling straight up into the sky, “Carole’s a real piece of work! She had me stay a _whole_ week after Shermie’s heart attack just to parade me in front of her gamblin’ friends. And not all of them were strictly women if you know what I’m sayin’.” 

Stanford silently rolled his eyes up into the sky, wiping his face. 

“Oh, I don’t know, Ley,” he chuckled, looking through the trees and seeing the shack's backyard, “It probably would not hurt for you to broaden your horizons.” 

“Maybe, but I wouldn’t go that far!” Stanley cringed, giving Mr. 12 Ph.D.’s the ol’ Stan Laurel head scratch on the crown of his head as the both of them started through the last of the forest. Ford just grinned right back at him, crossing his arms over his chest. 

He shook out his left arm, still feeling a few pinches in his muscles. 

“Yeesh,” Stan dropped his other arm from Ford’s shoulders and shook it out good and hard, “My arms are killing me!” 

“Well, I,” Stanford could not help but chuckle, exaggeratedly shrugged his arms up into the sky. 

“ _I_ didn’t ask you to hold the bunker door open while I was very obviously gluing it down with one hand and holding it up with the other, smart guy!” 

“Hey, that’s _my_ line!” 

Ford humorously narrowed his eyes, following his older brotherly instincts. 

“Oh really...” 

“Men! Boxing is a sport for winners. Are you winners or sissies?!” 

Stanford coughed and gasped for air. Imitating Coach Galinski and his smoke-impaired speech was always hard on his throat, but he finally tried it for the first time in decades. 

Stanley burst out laughing, cackling down to his knees. 

Now, this took him back. 

“I said...” Ford’s throat started to hurt as he brought his hands up into a boxing stance, bouncing back and forth on the balls of his feet, “ _are_ you winners or sissies, men?!” 

Stan looked up so fast he almost got whiplash. But maybe he imagined it, or it almost looked like they were in the Galinski Boxing Gym all over again. Even the old nerd, who always hated going there, had his dukes up ready for the hit. 

“A-are you serious, Poindexter, aft—” 

“Pines Number 2,” he confidently grinned back at the knucklehead, “I expected this kind of crap out of you. Don’t make me ask you ag—” 

And it was way too easy to get Sixer in a loose headlock; at least, the old nerd was laughing under his arms. 

Stanford just went straight for the old tickle spots on his waist. 

“Gahp! For—” 

Stanley attempted to recover, Poindexter releasing him as they circled one another in the shack’s backyard like they were in the ring once more, soft fists clenched up in the air. Stanford felt like he was in Dimension 280@& all over again, sensing his body feeling so light and airy not a single second of it felt wrong. 

But the knucklehead went straight for his legs and tackled him. 

“Unfair play, Pines Number 2!” he laughed, feeling Stanley’s old maneuver of sitting on his legs and repeatedly poking him in the face. Ford coughed as he kept slapping his hands away, conjuring up Galinski’s voice all over again. “If you do _that_ again, Pines Number 2, I’m gonna make you wash my car for a month!” 

“Up yours, P-Pines Nu-Number 1.” 

Stan couldn’t stop laughing, letting the old genius grab his wrist and wrapping it behind his back. He fell on the back lawn with a loud and happy sigh. Even Ford was chuckling as Stanley kept slapping his hand away as he tried to pin the other wrist on the other side of his head. 

“What are ya trying ta do ta me, Pines Number 1?” Stan chuckled as he tried imitating that dumb washed-up shmuck of a boxer, whacking Ford’s hand away from his a few more times. “You’re making _this_ gym look bad! Ten times around the ring, gleykh yetst!” 

“Up yours, Galinski!” Stanford laughed even harder, feeling tears drop past his nose and dripping down into Stan’s face. He lit up even brighter as the war to pin Ley’s hands down was starting to look like a losing battle. 

Stan grabbed the back of Ford’s knee and flipped him over onto his stomach, taking advantage of the handhold and wrapping the old nerd’s arm around his back. He sat down on the backs of Poindexter’s legs, happily victorious. 

Yep, the whole rule book was officially thrown out. 

Stanford kept crying, laughing, and realizing his tickle spots, at least on one side of his waist, remained the same after 40 years. 

“Damn it, Ley! St-stop!” 

“Say Uncle, nerd.” 

“That did _not_ work when we were kids, and it _does_ not work no—” 

“Excuse me, YOU. TWO. ARE. ADULTS!” 

“Huh?!” the both of them looked up at the back porch. 

Mabel took another deep breath as she victoriously stepped off the couch, looking a little dazed. She looked like she had just swum in the dust bin of a vacuum cleaner, covered from headband to sandals in lint and ash. Even Dipper... 

The real Dipper, the real Dipper, Stanley chanted to himself in his head. 

Dipper looked just as worst as he staggered out onto the porch, a few burn holes in the bill of his baseball cap and scratch marks all over his arms. Soos and Wendy stood in the doorway looking worse for wear, some smoke slowly emerging from behind them. 

“NOW!” Mabel shouted, stretching her arms up in the air. “We have a _little_ infestation of what Dipper says is called “Percepto-Bugs,” and we've apprehended a few colonies already. But they have taken Grenda and Candy, and we could _really_ use that huge gun of yours, Grunkle Ford!” 

“H-how...” Stanford managed to slide out from underneath the knucklehead. 

“Oof,” Stanley toppled backward and down on his tail bone, “Ow!” 

“ _How_ have you apprehended a _few_ colonies already?!” he walked towards the back porch and wildly shrugged his arms in the air, totally amazed at the kids’ efficiency in the face of dangerous situations. But being down in the bunker was not efficient. _That_ was just stupid. 

“Oh, you know...” Mabel confidently looked down to one foot but very clearly feigning sheepishness, and looking so much like her grandfather just then, it was almost terrifying. “A few Xyler and Craz-brand binoculars and _maybe_ a few fire extinguishers.” 

Stanford felt himself light up like a Christmas tree, smiling over at Stanley as he slowly trudged up beside him. He sprinted up the porch steps, almost gleefully shouting over his shoulder. 

“Stanley, I _love_ these kids!” 

Stan just stood there, shaking his head at all four of these numbskulls. A good shouting match of ruining his... Ford’s … their (???) home started the low boil before officially exploding. 

“Hey knucklehead, I have _two_ Recogn-Rays!” hollered through the back door.

Yeah, standing here yelling wasn’t worth it. 

“Right behind ya, Poindexter!” 

\+ 

His muscles ached like a real sonuva bitch. 

Stanley woke up in total pain, between nearly tearing his arms off with the bunker door and running around the house with a pretty cool reverse blowtorch-like gun Ford invented. But at least he wasn’t sleeping up against the headboard again. The ice-cold air from his fan blasted him right in the face, and it felt like the perfect “good morning” before coffee got involved. Maybe he could surprise the old nerd with a hug because they, sure as hell, were NEVER going to get into another tickle war ever again! 

He could barely lift his arms to his face even if he wanted to. 

“Alright, Stan,” he grumbled to himself, slowly opening his eyes, “another day, another random body pain. Here we go.” 

Stan threw his legs over the side of his bed, sinking them into very wet slippers. 

“Ugh!” 

**Author's Note:**

> Rejected Tags: Two Old Men having a picnic, I’m sorry Bunker Caterpillars, Adorable Old Men Brothers Taking Care of Each Other, Stanford “Dimension-Hopper” Pines vs. Dust Bunnies
> 
> Rejected Titles: The Fall Out Shelter Boys, Surveillance Says


End file.
